


In My House

by Rebellion_Bear



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, Rating May Change, Streaky the cat, minor Mike Matthews - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-03
Updated: 2019-04-11
Packaged: 2019-07-24 16:18:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 41,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16178699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rebellion_Bear/pseuds/Rebellion_Bear
Summary: Supercorp vampire AU. Kara buys a house, unaware that someone else already "lives" there. Taken in her prime in the 1920s, Lena watches from the shadows as room after room of her home is opened to the sun, brightened and taken over, until she has nowhere left but the cellar. She's forced to make a decision: make herself known and try to make peace, or end this intrusion.Inspired by this prompt: https://twitter.com/Jen_Mal12/status/1046880518808190976





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So, now I understand other writers who end up with 15 stories going at once. I couldn't resist this prompt. I haven't written a vampire character in a long time and I miss it. 
> 
> I'm going to make up my vampire lore as I go, using what I feel like. I do love the epistolary format of the original "Dracula," so I may make than an element here for fun.

She was furious. Someone was in her house. Her house that she had meticulously secured and protected as her property in 1925 when she could still walk in the light of day. She had set up trusts, put property lawyers on permanent retainer, tried to foresee every future obstacle. Sure, the caretaker had died, and she had been procrastinating on trying to find someone new, so it had fallen into a bit of disrepair over the last twenty years. But it was only 20 years. That was nothing. 

Some conman was in her house.

“… So if you’re looking to flip it, this is a great investment. You know, rip off those ugly shutters, some new paint and a little elbow grease and you’ll make a killing,” he said with a sleazy smile.

Lena watched the woman, who looked uncomfortable with how close the sleazebag was standing, adjust her glasses before speaking.  
“No, no. I just want a place of my own. Are you sure this is the real price? I’m a little worried about this auction advance thing, Mike. I never heard of it and neither has my sister.”  
“Well, you wouldn’t of course. It’s totally legit, I guarantee. Abandoned properties like this are usually auctioned off on the courthouse steps, but some real estate insiders like myself have created a pre-sale process that takes a lot of the red tape out of it and makes things easier on the county and the banks and the buyers. Just like buy-it-now on eBay! Everyone wins, right?!”  
“As long as the legal documents are in order, I guess it’s okay.”  
“Absolutely! Feel free to have a lawyer look these over any time, though, you know, if you need to save a few grand on something a lawyer will shuffle off to some paralegal, just skip it. Hell, I would. Save that money for paint and repairs, right?” he guffawed in a way that made Lena feel nauseous. Since she hadn’t eaten anything in nearly a hundred years that was saying something.  
“And your real bargaining chip is having the whole payment in hand,” he continued. “That’s still the case, right? Because we have to go to auction if you don’t, and then it’s anybody’s game. This is a prime piece of real estate.”  
“Yes, I’ve got it. I’ve been holding on to some settlement money I got when I was a kid. It’s covered.”

He clapped her a little too hard on her back and then pulled it into an inappropriate one-armed hug-squeeze that made Lena and the girl he was mauling both wince.  
Lena really hated this guy. The woman was just a dupe, apparently.  
Well, there was one thing she could do at least for revenge. Since it was getting close to time for her to feed again, her corporeal body was harder to manifest, but that meant her other-realm self was stronger. She made sure she was quite unseeable then flew down over the staircase railing. She looked past the suit and inside his flesh. With a flick of her wrists and focused intent she sent a wedge of frigid energy directly to his colon.  
“Shit!” he yelled, scaring the young woman.  
“What?” she gasped.  
“Nothing!” He squirmed, squeezing his thighs together. He dropped a set of keys into her hand. “Gotta go. Lock up. Call you later!” he squeaked out as he ran out the front door and inside his luxury car.

“What an asshole,” Lena murmured and was surprised when the blonde whipped around toward her as if she’d heard her. Lena hurriedly checked again to be sure her cloak was in place. Maybe she was out of practice with staying silent.  
The woman looked right through her. And now that she was on the same level, Lena could see her better. She was beautiful. A little vulnerable and naive looking perhaps. Uncertain. But beautiful, and so full of life.  
Lena watched as she swept her eyes around the room and then shook her head.  
“It’s nothing,” the woman said to herself. “You’re just creeped out by that creep.”

The woman walked another round through the house. Lena followed. She touched Lena’s things. Of course things didn’t matter to Lena anymore, but it felt odd after so long to see someone look closely at the antiques that had once been part of her socialite life.  
It was a long time ago. She’d moved on. And the world had moved on. She needed to feed. She was getting maudlin, a sure sign of hunger.  
She would fly somewhere tonight. Or maybe tomorrow night. No real rush. It was never any trouble to pick up a meal. As long as she didn’t hunt in the same place twice.

The young woman was stepping out the front door, and as she turned to close and lock it she paused, whispering, “I promise to take care of you,” to the deserted home. Deserted except for the lone soul who had occupied it since her demise.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lena goes out for a drink and things have changed when she gets back.

With a swoop she had perfected over the years Lena darted through the hole in the eaves and landed deftly against the sloping underdeck of the roof, hooking her clawed thumbs into the groove between planks until the claws on her feet found purchase, too, and she could blissfully hang upside down. 

This was one of the odder parts of her transitions, but she enjoyed it. It was simple and meditative.

Leading up to a feed she always felt wispy and barely there, untethered and scattered. She could fly anywhere nearly as fast as it took to think of a place. But then it would take all of her focus to be whole enough to blend in with some humans and feed. Sometimes she resorted to enchantment to make them think she was solid. And then, after drinking, the lightness of being was gone, and instead she was fully corporeal, almost warm, like living flesh and blood. Luckily, she could still transform into her bat body and fly home by night. She had hidden resting spots, dark waystations, if it took more than one evening.

Then she would land here, in the darkest corner of the attic, hang, and fall deep asleep. She would wake on the floor, somehow still in the clothes she’d worn when she changed. She’d stopped questioning it. The process threw her daily rhythms off, and sometimes she’d wake in the day and have to wait until the sun receded across the floor before she dared go downstairs. There were cracks and crevices, and those grimy windows on each end of the space, letting yellow, dusty beams through. But her corner was safe. 

This time she woke to the darkness of night and pulled herself off the floor with a groan. She really should drag a divan up here or something, but it never seemed important except in this one moment when her body was recovering from the transformation and everything, especially her hands and chest, ached as if she’d been stretched on a rack. It was then that she wished she could still feel the effects of alcohol.

“Bugger me,” she grumbled as she staggered toward the steep wooden stairs and the doorway down to the second floor, massaging her hands to try to ease the pain. She clomped down in the dark, each step creaking loudly with every bootfall. Her eyes were no longer the red-brown of her bat form, but her eyesight remained impeccable in the dark.

She opened the door and squinted at the lights on below. She hadn’t had electricity on in decades. 

A dark blonde head emerged from the lit parlor, looking around as she petted a cat in her arms. Lena quickly stepped back out of sight on the landing, and though she was tired she managed to cloak herself before stepping forward and looking over the rail once again. 

It was that same woman from before, apparently making herself at fucking home. The cat stared right at Lena, who made a face and stuck her tongue out at it. It struggled in the woman’s arms and jumped free, returning to the parlor with its tail high.

“Streaky! What’s wrong?” the woman said, then looked up to where Lena stood, seeing nothing. 

Oh, she looks even better now, Lena thought. More relaxed. I guess that slimy gongoozler took a hint and pissed off. 

The woman mounted the stairs with quick light steps and Lena stepped back to a shadowy corner just to be safe. Once her home invader’s back was turned as she faced the attic door, Lena stepped close behind her. She was curious to see if the woman had any awareness of her presence at all. 

The woman reached a hand toward the door knob then froze. Lena leaned into her space. If she’d had breath, the woman would have felt it. 

The woman pulled back the sleeve of the ridiculously patterned flannel pajama top she wore, revealing a dense pattern of goose flesh on her arm. She made a quick turn, forcing Lena to jump back to avoid being brushed against, then descended the stairs much faster than she’d climbed up, uttering, “Nope, nope, nope, nope …” all the way into the parlor. 

Lena let out a full deep laugh for the first time in years. It felt magnificent. 

There was a sharp yelp downstairs, and Lena watched the girl dart out the front door in her slippers and pajamas, clutching her phone and her cat. Lena happily took the opportunity to prowl her own house and see what had been done to it while she was gone. 

A small bedroom on the second floor had been cleaned, stripped of wallpaper, painted, and a new mattress and linens moved in. The furniture had been dusted and polished, hardwood floors washed, and—much to Lena’s horror—the heavy shutters on the outside had been removed, exposing nearly floor-to-ceiling windows behind new drapery.

Shit, Lena thought as she went from room to room. A small bathroom had been cleaned and shined, but the shutters remained in place there. The parlor below looked in mid-process. A few modern lamps were plugged in around the room, hideously mismatched with her furniture.

The massive Davenport sofa looked like it had had the dust beaten out of it, but nearly everything else in the room retained its grime, particularly the tarnished mirror over the mantle, which was barely a reflective surface anymore.  
_____

“I’m telling you, I heard a laugh, plain as day. And stompy footsteps on the attic stairs,” Kara huffed.  
“You are spooking yourself out in this haunted dump is what’s happening,” Alex said with a teasing tone.  
“Don’t laugh! Streaky knows it’s real,” Kara insisted.  
“Don’t drag my beautiful niece into this,” Alex said, petting the cat in Kara’s arms as they opened the door and came into the house. Alex was wearing a kevlar vest and her sidearm and carrying her tactical helmet. “I will clear the house for you, and then I get to go back home away from all this dust, that’s the deal.” She strapped the helmet in place.  
“Right. Just be careful,” Kara said, giving in to Streaky’s demands and setting her on the floor. The cat walked toward a shadowy corner of the room then sat and stared at nothing with an unimpressed look on her face.  
“Ok, that’s weird,” said Alex.  
“See,” said Kara.  
“I’ll start in the attic. You stay close to the door. If you hear anything strange or I come running out, you run outside and call the cops, got it?”  
“Yes,” said Kara.  
“Don’t be a hero and try to come help me, right? I mean, nothing is in the house, but just in case. It’s better for you to go for help than to head into danger. Got it?”  
Kara sighed. “Got it.”  
Alex trudged up to the second floor, opened the attic door, then pulled a small powerful flashlight from her belt and headed up the stairs. In a few minutes she was back down.  
“Attic is clear,” she stated. She went room to room on the second floor until she had been in all of them. “Clear.” Then she went to the first floor and followed the same procedure. “Clear,” she said. “I’m going home now,” she said, clipping the light back to her belt and pulling off the helmet.  
“Wait,” said Kara. “There’s the cellar.”  
“Jeez, really?” Alex griped, rolling her head around and trying to ease up her shoulders. She might think her sister was imagining things, but she still took the task seriously, and it tended to make a person tense. “You moved into a fucking horror movie set, you know that, right?”  
“I did not, this is a great house. It’s just been neglected for a while and the electricity is kind of out of date. And the plumbing. And the heat,” she muttered the last.  
Alex rolled her eyes and palmed her light again as she rested the helmet back on her head. “Where is it?”  
Kara led her to the dark kitchen and pointed to a door off a small alcove.  
“You owe me so big for this,” Alex said. She tromped down the wooden stairs and miraculously found a hanging lightbulb fixture that worked. She turned it on, creating creepshow-perfect swinging shadows, and looked around.  
“You have cobwebs on cobwebs down here. Nobody’s walked through here in years,” she shouted up.  
“You’re sure?” Kara called back.  
“Positive,” Alex replied as she turned the light off and walked back up. “It looks like there might be some cool historic stuff down there that you’d be into, though. You know, in the light of day when the ghosts are sleeping,” she teased, waggling her eyebrows and making some not very impressive ghost-like noises, trying to be funny.

Despite her sister’s teasing, Kara breathed a little easier. She walked Alex, who was dramatically brushing nonexistent cobwebs off her sleeves, to the front door. Streaky was still staring into the corner and now her tail was switching across the floor from side to side.  
Alex stopped, tucked the helmet under her arm, and cocked her head. Kara nearly bumped into her from behind.  
Alex strode around Streaky and into the corner where she knocked on a couple of the dark wooden wall panels. “Maybe you’ve got mice,” she said as she looked up and down for holes or cracks in the walls.

Kara’s blood ran cold when she saw Streaky’s focus distinctly move to the right when Alex walked into the corner. And her cat’s eyes weren’t directed at floor level, where mice would be. She was looking higher. About five feet up. For some reason Kara decided not to say anything to Alex about that.

“Maybe you’re right. I’ll look up how to tell if you have mice later,” Kara said.  
“Good idea. If you need an exterminator, I can ask around for recommendations.” Alex kissed her sister on the cheek and headed for the door. “Good night, sis. Get some sleep. Love you,” she called as she slipped out. 

Kara turned back to the empty room. Streaky got up, turned around and meowed at her. Then she strutted into the kitchen where her food bowl was.  
Kara stared at the spot where Streaky had been looking. She couldn’t see anything, but she couldn’t help but feel there was something there. She thought it might be wise to cover her bases, even if it made her feel foolish.  
“Hi, I’m Kara. I don’t mind if you … peacefully … haunt here. Just don’t hurt my cat.” She rushed into the kitchen. Well, that worked out just as she thought it would. She did, indeed, feel like a complete fool now. Her sister was right. She had moved into a scary movie house and she was spooking herself out.  
Once she was in the kitchen spooning food into Streaky’s bowl, she told herself she definitely definitely definitely absolutely did not hear footsteps climbing the stairs.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are progressing nicely.

Lena glared at the cat. It was lucky she liked cats. Lex would have killed it. Hell, he’d killed her hadn’t he? 

She shook the thought from her head. The past was past. She had a problem now, and she needed to think about it strategically. She needed to get rid of this squatter, Kara the meek, without attracting enough attention to get anyone poking around too much. 

She could try to scare her out, but that sister might be a problem. She didn’t look like she’d intimidate easily. And Kara was under the impression that she’d bought the house, which was ludicrous. Obviously she’d fallen for some scam. 

One thing was certain, it would be exhausting trying to stay cloaked all the time, and she wasn’t going to do it. She dropped the cloak since Kara was now in the kitchen with the blasted cat and made her way back upstairs and into the master bedroom. At least it was still as she’d left it. She locked the door behind her and sprawled on the bed, staring at the ceiling. 

Her hearing was annoyingly acute after feeding, and she could hear the woman in the kitchen singing to her cat. A song about her cat. To her cat. And she had a nice voice.

_Streaky streaky streaky is the beeeeest cat_  
_What-oh-what-oh-what do you think about that_  
_You are not-oh-not-oh-not a scaredy cat_  
_Like meeeeeeee_

Oh dear god.

Lena put her hands over her face. She had survived 117 years. She could survive this. She would wait until the infestation went to sleep then go write her solicitors. She was still alive on paper, by god, and she had money and lawyers that could make this go away. 

_____

Kara didn’t hear any other strange noises after the footsteps going upstairs, which she definitely did not hear, and she was exhausted from working on the house all day, so she had a glass of milk and decided to call it a night. She turned out the lights in the parlor and cautiously climbed the stairs in the dark. So many of the ceiling fixtures needed bulbs replaced and she hadn’t gotten around to that yet. Everything seemed quiet, and Streaky was acting normal again, passing her and then waiting for her on the landing. 

She went through her nightly bathroom routine. Definitely needed to work on getting those shutters open tomorrow. A task she really didn’t look forward to. The first set had been next to impossible to remove with rusty screws that stripped in seconds and dozens of lag bolts in the cross boards. It was as if the entire house was prepared for a massive hurricane or a zombie attack. It had taken her half a day.

She wondered about the previous owner. Much of the furniture was from the early twentieth century, though there were pieces from other decades as well. The refrigerator, thank god it still worked because new ones cost a fortune, was from the sixties. The master bedroom suite was mid-century modern. The pieces in this small guest room might have been from the 1800s, she wasn’t sure. If she’d wanted to sell the furniture she might recoup a lot of what she’d paid for the house, but she really didn’t want to part with it. It felt like part of the house and its history, and that’s what had made her fall in love with the place to begin with.

So, going by the furniture, she speculated that there was probably one occupant for a long time. She hadn’t seen any evidence of family life. No height marks etched in a doorway. No forgotten toys in the attic. There were some crated-up paintings in a storage closet that she was dying to unpack, but that wasn’t a priority, so it would have to wait.

Her mind kept wandering. If the original owner had lived here forever, it might make sense that her spirit was still floating around. Kara wasn’t sure why she thought of them as a her, but she did. And it might annoy her that somebody was in her house. So Kara would just have to show that she cared about the house, too, and she wasn’t going to tear it up or change too much. Maybe that would appease her ghost.

Her heart jolted when she felt movement on the bed next to her. She puffed out a breath of relief when she realized it was just Streaky settling in. She made biscuits on the duvet and purred for a bit, then laid down and let Kara pet her gently. 

“Good night, Streaky. We’re going to have to make friends with the ghost tomorrow. You’ll be a good kitty and be nice, right?” Streaky made no promises. 

_____

Lena had written the letter and it was ready to post. But the cat was in her lap and she hated to disturb her. Streaky. What a ridiculous name for a cat. She was highly intelligent and deserved a meaningful name, like Minerva. Regardless, Lena couldn’t sit around all night. She scooped up the cat and set it on the floor, took her letter and left the house by the back door, as always. 

It wouldn’t do for the squatter to perhaps see new outgoing mail, so Lena blended with the night and made her way to the university campus, where she often spent her evenings. She posted the letter in a box outside the library then slipped to the spot along the side where streetlights cast shadows from the trees and scaled the side of the building. 

It had only taken a little digging through Kara’s fraudulent purchasing papers to come up with the name Mike Matthews. As Lena popped the maintenance hatch and dropped to the floor below, she pondered the best ways to make him suffer. She made her way down the stairwell and to her favorite research librarian’s workstation. She rounded the desk with the Eve Tessmacher name plate and sat down, booting up the computer and entering the password helpfully kept in a notepad in the bottom desk drawer.

Of course she could have sent an e-mail to her law firm, but technically she was supposed to be an ancient old lady. She had to play the part a bit. She had kept up with technology over the years, but she didn’t use most of it. It left electronic trails that she didn’t care for. 

And speaking of electronic trails, here was Sleazy Matthews glad handing a tax commissioner, donating to a city councilman’s charity golf tournament, a membership to an exclusive though dubious business club. She found his phone number and address, and in a few tries, using a little trick she’d learned by spying on a student, she had access to his text messages. 

Lena was grateful for her ability to comprehend the written word at tremendous speed as she rapidly scrolled through the dregs of banality. Thank god the images didn’t show up in this format. One number raised her suspicions, so she tracked it down. The messages to this one were cryptic yet subtly threatening. It belonged to a young woman, and Lena proceeded to delve into her somewhat open life on social media. Ah. She works in the county property records office. Of course. Blackmail. 

Lena silently thanked Ms. Tessmacher for use of her computer and internet access and left the building. She would wait a week or so before she visited Mike’s house. Perhaps to set it on fire since he’d stolen hers. It was a good distance out of town, and it would be easier to get there when she wasn’t so recently fed. For now, a good walk back to her own place would be nice. And then she had to figure out the best way to keep her squatter away from her during the day.  
_____

Maybe the shutters on the kitchen windows were the ones she needed to tackle next, Kara thought as she spooned coffee in her coffee maker by flashlight. It would be nice to have sunlight in here. She shone the light on the ceiling fixture and eyed the number of dead bugs stacked inside it with dread. After coffee and breakfast. There was a little more light by the gas stove, so she was able to start her eggs using both hands, and soon she was seated at the old dining table with the massive carved legs. 

She had her note pad of to-do’s beside her plate, and she added a few more things to it while she ate. 

Remove kitchen shutters  
Kitchen bulb  
Finish parlor  
Check out cellar  
Contractor — J’onn “around 4:00”

As a joke she added: Make friends with ghost.  
She laughed to herself. It all seemed kind of ridiculous now. Alex was never going to let her live this down.


	4. Chapter 4

Maybe the shutters on the kitchen windows were the ones she needed to tackle next, Kara thought as she spooned coffee in her coffee maker by flashlight. It would be nice to have sunlight in here. She shone the light on the domed ceiling fixture and eyed the plethora of dead bugs stacked inside it with dread. There was a little more light by the gas stove, so she was able to start her eggs without the flashlight, and soon she was seated at the dark wood dining table. 

She had her note pad of to-do’s beside her plate, and she added a few more things to it while she ate. 

Remove kitchen shutters  
Kitchen bulb  
Finish parlor  
Check out cellar  
Contractor — J’onn “around 4:00”

As a joke she added: Make friends with ghost.  
She laughed to herself. It all seemed kind of ridiculous now. Alex was never going to let her live this down.

_____

At first Lena bothered to stay cloaked as she watched Kara from the balcony as the woman cleaned rooms and boxed up things that Lena had acquired over the years. There wasn’t a lot. But the girl had earbuds in and was singing so obliviously that Lena stopped bothering with the invisibility. In fact, she sat in the dark on the top step and petted Kara’s cat, who scowled at the vacuum. Lena concurred. It was a terrible racket, but she couldn’t tear herself away for some reason. 

She should be sleeping. She should be plotting her way out of this mess in case the lawyers didn’t come through. She should be devising ways to scare the woman out of her wits and send her running. 

But instead she watched with mild amusement as Kara sang her way through a playlist that was a deep dive into the ’90s. When Kara slowed and moved to the kitchen to make her lunch, Lena retreated to the master bedroom, locking the door and lying down for the day.

_____

Kara had made a huge sandwich for herself and set it down on the table when she realized she hadn’t seen Streaky for most of the morning. She called her with no results, then did a quick look around and under things on the first floor. 

She bounded up the stairs and around the corner of the hall she found Streaky at the door to the master bedroom with one of her front legs probing underneath it. She meowed at Kara, flopped to her other side and tried the other paw.

“What do you want in there, sweetie?” Kara cooed, knowing Streaky hated being locked out of rooms. She went to turn the handle, but it was stuck. She tried again. It almost felt locked. There must be a metal spur or something stuck, she thought. She tried to muscle it a little but gave up. The last thing she wanted to do was break it. All the door hardware was original and she wanted to keep it that way. Another quirk of the house.

“Another time, I guess, baby,” she said and returned downstairs for her lunch. Streaky gave up as well in favor of food.

After lunch Kara wanted to prolong her break from cleaning, so she decided she needed to take the stuff she’d boxed up into the cellar, and if she happened to run across some fascinating old junk down there as Alex had hinted, well, she had been working all morning after all.

With a broom waving in front of her she cleared away generations of cobwebs in a path to the most interesting feature of the cellar, a worktable surrounded by shelves of boxes. She uncovered neatly organized and stored fine tools, carefully sorted gears and springs and dismantled watches. Fascinating.

She backed up to try to take it all in and her eyes landed on something incongruous, a pink hat box tucked far underneath the bench behind a box of heavier tools. She slid the tools to one side and extracted the box carefully. Peeking inside, she thought she might have discovered more than she had even hoped for.

_____

 

My Dearest Lena,

I read your note a thousand times, as if I could hear each word from your lips in your dulcet voice and feel them brush against the cup of my ear as you whispered them to me in that way that you do, pretending to gossip with your eyes on fire yet all the while telling me the boldest, barest truths.

You were right. I do think about you. It helps me get through the marital duties and have a smile on my face at the end of it, and if we’re blessed a babe in the future. I should be grateful that Jonathan is only 12 years my senior and quite handsome, but still I find his company lacking compared to you, my dearest companion. 

You should note, however, that I am determined to comport myself more like a married lady of standing in future, though secretly I wish I could still act the wild girl I am inside. I know you pride yourself on your clever tongue, but it isn’t without consequences. The morning after our tête-à-tête at the Harrington’s ball Minnie was dressing my hair and urged me to be more discreet with my friend. Apparently we set the servants talking. I don’t know how I will manage as everything from your lips fills me with uncontainable joy. Every time I trust myself to your capable hands they seem to be my undoing. 

As to your final words, I shouldn’t worry too much about irascible Lex. You know he goes through his intense phases when he has a new passion in his life. Poor boy, he is a genius and a fool. Perhaps this Clark will settle him.

Yours always and forever,  
Mina

__

Kara stared at the letter as she sat at the tiny secretary in the parlor next to a late-afternoon beam of sunlight streaming through the screen door. Dust motes swirled in the air like tiny fairies. 

Did it mean what she thought it meant? Because it sounded like a veiled reference to a steamy affair.

The hat box had been crammed with letters, most it seemed from the 1920s and early 1930s, all addressed to Lena Luthor.

So far she had pulled a few at random, charmed by the polite correspondence about galas and charities and fashion, and placed them carefully back in place. Then she noticed a bundle tied in blue silk ribbon, all on the same stationery. They showed more wear than the others as if they had been read again and again. The one now in her hand had been the first of the stack. 

Kara wondered if there was a historical society for National City, or perhaps microfiche of old newspapers at the library. She was dying to know more about this socialite and apparent lover of married ladies.

A knock on the door disrupted her thoughts. It must be J’onn. She quickly set the box on the floor, resting the ribbon letters on top of the others and gently fitting the lid in place.

Standing at the door was a muscular man with dark skin, short hair and kind eyes. He was a little older than she’d expected, but that was probably good. Perhaps he would know more about houses of this era if he’d been in the business for a while.

“Miss Danvers?” he asked as she opened the door.  
“Mr J’onzz I presume?” she said extending her hand with a smile, which he returned.  
“Indeed,” he said as they shook hands. “Call me J’onn. Shall we give the place a look and you can show me what you want done?”

An hour later, as the light was fading, J’onzz had filled out three sheets of a legal pad on a metal clipboard box and given her more advice and detail on what would need to be done to bring her home fully up to code than she could absorb. 

It was almost as if he could read her mind when he said, “Don’t worry. I’ll type everything up tonight and send you a detailed estimate by morning. You’re lucky I had a client drop off my calendar. Usually it would be a few weeks before I could get to it.” He followed her inside. “My, it gets quite dark in here.”

“I know,” Kara said. “It’s the shutters. It’s slow going getting them off. If my budget wasn’t so tight, I’d add it to your list, but it’s something I can manage myself, even if it takes forever.”

He seemed to consider her words for a moment as he stepped back onto the porch and examined the exterior of the shutters.

“It seems the previous owner went a little overboard on boarding the place up,” he remarked.

“I know!” Kara said. “I think someone must’ve sealed the whole place up after she died. I mean, I don’t know if that’s what happened for sure, or who used to live here. But it’s probably why the place is still in such good shape. Nobody could break in.”

J’onn stepped back into the yard and looked the house over once more from top to bottom, his arms crossed over his barrel chest. “Well, someone has,” he said, pointing to a hole in the eaves at the top of the house. “Though I suspect it’s something small and furry rather than a thief. I can fix that, too, but I’ll need you to check your attic to make sure there’s no active nesting before we seal it up.”

“Nesting?” Kara asked, thinking of one more unpleasant task she would have to add to her list.

“Look for shredded newspaper, insulation that’s been disturbed, that type of thing. And droppings. I think you’ll be able to tell if it’s abandoned or an active nest, but don’t disturb it if it’s occupied. I’ll call in my pest removal people if we need to,” he said.

“Droppings?” Kara repeated, her eyes wide. “How much would that add?” she asked tentatively.

“I’m afraid it’s not cheap,” he said, “but they’re thorough. It’s worth the investment to know the critters are gone and can’t get back in.”

“Ok. I guess,” she said.  
“We’ve got about 15 minutes of light left,” J’onn said with a smile. He wanted to end the day on a happier note for this potential client. It was a house he would love to work on. “I’ve got a cordless drill in the truck that can make quick work of those lag bolts,” he said as he came back up on the porch and tapped the offending hardware. “That way you could get started first thing and it won’t take nearly as long. Which set would you rather start with? The kitchen or the front of the house?”

It only took her a moment to decide. “Kitchen!”  
“Great,” he said, and in moments he had what he needed from his truck. “If you have a good heavy-duty bit for metal, you can put a drop of oil on the screw heads and then just core them out with the drill. Then the hinges will pop right off.”  
“Oh, that’s a great idea!” Kara beamed. “Thanks!”  
“And this is complementary, by the way,” he added. “No charge, whether you accept my bid or not.”  
“Thanks, J’onn,” she said and stood by amazed as he took out several dozen lag bolts in a few minutes’ time.  
_____

After J’onn left, Kara went back inside, turning on her mismatched lamps and the ceiling fixtures that worked. She thought she heard a door creak from above. Streaky looked up and meowed then bounded up the stairs. If Streaky wasn’t afraid of the ghost, she wouldn’t be either.

She picked up the box of letters from the floor and began packing them neatly back as they had been, then, thinking back to J’onn’s instructions, she decided now was as good a time as any to check the attic. Nothing to be afraid of. Might as well get it over with. Alex hadn’t mentioned anything last night, but she needed to be sure. 

She took the hat box and a flashlight to the second floor, depositing the treasure trove of letters in her bedroom for later. She sat on her bed and texted Alex.

Kara: The probably my new contractor guy noticed a hole in the house. He used the word “vermin.”  
Alex: Ha! I knew it! Rats in the walls!  
Kara: You said mice. MICE IS DIFFERENT FROM RATS  
Alex: wevr  
Kara: I’m going up to the attic now to see if there is a nest. Come rescue me if you don’t hear back in 30  
Alex: Roger that 

She pocketed her phone, took a deep breath for courage and headed for the attic, carefully closing the door behind her so that Streaky wouldn’t follow. Just in case. There could be poisons or traps up here. She shone her flashlight around as soon as her head was above the floor level. It looked fairly ordinary. Dry, dusty, not too full of junk, surprisingly. 

She climbed the rest of the stairs, careful not to hit her head against the slant of the ceiling as she emerged fully into the room. She gave the light chain a little tug but nothing happened. Aiming her flashlight toward the front window she found the hole in the eaves easily enough. It was at least squirrel sized, definitely bigger than mice. She hoped for squirrels over rats. If there was anything. Mostly she hoped for nothing. 

She started on that end of the room and peered into each narrowing slope, behind the chimney, under sheets of plywood that lay across the beams. She found a broomstick without the broom and poked around.

By the time she finished looking into every corner she was positive there were no active nests … and no droppings, thank goodness. And her nose was full of dust and grime. She planned a long shower in her near future.  
_____

Lena heard Kara tromping around in the attic, so she emerged from the bedroom, scooped up Streaky and wandered around the house with her. 

More cleaning had been done. The parlor looked quite decent. She couldn’t tell if much progress had been made after she fell asleep, though. 

She perused a note pad with a to-do list ending in “make friends with ghost.” She picked up a pencil and scratched in all capitals, LEAVE MY HOUSE.

At the telltale clomps of Kara coming down from the attic, Lena set Streaky down and found a dark spot under the stairs to wait and listen. There was rummaging in the bedroom, then the bathroom. She bath faucets were turned on and then the shower. She waited until she heard singing before stepping lightly back upstairs to retrieve her book from the master bedroom.

She supposed it was normal for the bathroom door to be wide open since presumably Kara thought she was alone in the house. And Lena tried to resist glancing. She did. But it was the shock of what she glanced that made her stop.

Where was the shower curtain? She had had a shower curtain, hadn’t she? It was gone, and an astoundingly well formed woman stood under the rainlike fall of water, lathering parts of her athletic body and rinsing, singing beautifully at the top of her lungs. 

Lena thought back to all the women she had seduced in her youth, in her human days and after. Babe Paley had bought her a Tiffany bracelet in gratitude. Veronica Sinclair had been willing to commit every sin they could think of. None of them, except one, compared to Kara in her natural allure. 

She tore her eyes away. There were books in the library, and that’s where she locked herself for the evening.   
_____

Just as she was about to crawl into bed, Kara realized she’d left her laptop downstairs. She was too tired to delve into the delicate letters tonight, but some Netflix would be a good sleep aid.

She trundled down the stairs, searching below as she went. The library. She’d left it on the desk in there. 

She strode to the door at the back of the parlor and frowned when she found it locked. What the hell. She had just been in there this afternoon. What was with the doors in this place?

“Dammit. Maybe J’onn can get it open tomorrow,” she told Streaky, who meowed plaintively at the door.

Kara settled for reading her phone in bed. 

Lena let Streaky into the library later. Together they browsed through Kara’s personal life via her entirely unsecured laptop computer. Photos, emails, articles, browser history. 

When she found the insurance documents she stopped. She searched Kara’s last name and the year 2003 for news stories. The girl had lost everyone and everything. But she seemed so full of joy now. And she’d found a family to love her again. Lena felt a pang of envy. 

Misery had followed her own attempts to find someone to connect with. Until she’d given up. 

Lena realized Kara had given all of her money from the insurance from the loss of her family for this house. To a man who didn’t have the right to sell it. She vowed she would make him return the money in addition to punishing him for what he’d done. 

She closed everything onscreen and put the laptop down. Perhaps she had pried a little too much. She knew a lot more about her house guest now. The intruder. Kara.

She wandered through the house and found herself outside Kara’s bedroom. 

The young woman slept soundly, sprawled on her belly, clutching a pillow to her chest. 

Lena didn’t feel as driven to run the woman away anymore. What if she stayed? Could Lena live with that much light in her house?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I left my laptop at work, so I posted this from my phone. Apologies for any errors.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What you've been waiting for. Long chapter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer:  
> I know nothing about real estate, cons, or laws regarding land.  
> Also rating changed because I’m pretty sure this will go there.
> 
> Also also, I love drunk Alex and Vasquez brotps.
> 
> Hat tip to wtfoctagon for Jess’ last name, Huang. Also, the law firm partner, Huang, in the firm's name is Jess’ mother. Jess and Sam are not senior partners yet, thus the weird case getting shoved off on them.

Jess tapped the aged paper envelope on her desk, her chin in one hand, staring at it as if her glare could untangle this little oddity. 

The glare went uninterrupted as Sam breezed in, 18 minutes late as usual. Morning teen drama delays were pretty much the norm now. But at least Sam noticed that Jess was in a quandary.

“What’s up? You’re looking at that envelope like it spit in your tea.”  
“Metaphorically it did because now I don’t feel like drinking it as it’s gone cold while I try to figure this out.”  
“Give it,” Sam demanded, holding her hand out palm up. Jess obeyed with a small smile. Technically it was now Sam’s problem. 

Sam pulled out the letter and read, first noting that it written on quite old stationery from someone named Lena Luthor.

_To the current solicitors of Masters, Marsden, Pendlay and Huang_

_I regret to inform you that I have discovered a squatter in my home, one Kara Danvers. Evidence indicates that she was subject to some sort of flimflam and seems to be under the most exceedingly incorrect impression that she has purchased property that belongs to me at the address above._

_As your longtime client, I expect you to investigate the matter, beginning with a man by the name of Michael M. Matthews, “realtor,” who transacted the swindling of Miss Danvers._

_Thus far I have been successful at eluding the young lady, but the effort is very distressing, and I do not like people in my home who have not been invited. I insist you take care of this matter and the removal of Miss Danvers from my property forthwith._

_Sincerely,_

_Lena Luthor_

Sam couldn’t quit staring at the page. Perhaps if she stared long enough it would make sense. “What the fuck?” she asked simply.  
“Indeed,” replied Jess. “Look at the stamp,” she suggested.  
“Did they even make these anymore?” Sam asked, examining the 10-cent stamp. “Where did this come from?” She checked the date again. It was written two days ago.  
“Pendlay handed it to me and in no uncertain terms said we were to take care of it. Said Ms. Luthor has been a client since his father was a clerk.”  
“She must be ancient. And there’s somebody in her house? I mean … isn’t that something the police should handle? She’s hiding in her own house?” Sam lowered the paper and stared at Jess.  
“What are you going to do?” Jess asked.  
“Me? Oh no, this is a ‘we’ situation, baby. First let’s get the property records. You call the courthouse. I’ll start looking into Matthews.”  
_____

Kara woke slowly with remnants of a dream floating in the back of her consciousness.  
Streaky sat on her chest and made a disgruntled raspy mew at her human. 

She’d dreamed about someone wandering around the house. She blinked a few times. At least it wasn’t one of her nightmares. 

She had a big day ahead. First she needed to check her email for J’onn’s estimate. 

_Mrrraaaaa_

Kara took the hint and rolled out of bed, Streaky under one arm, and trundled downstairs. Oddly, she spotted her laptop on the floor by the Davenport sofa. She put down the cat and picked up the computer. The battery was a bit low, but she didn’t really think anything of it as she flopped down on the sofa and checked her email. 

The estimate was higher than she had hoped, but still in a range she could cover. Barely. With nothing left to spare. She set the computer aside, put her forehead head in her hands and breathed deeply. In and out. She had committed everything to this house, and it was everything she had been dreaming of. Her own special place. Independence. Something with character. A place to call home. The repairs had to be done right, and she had a good feeling about J’onn. Before she could overthink it she sent him a quick reply to say she wanted him to do the work. His note had said he could be there as early as 10 to get started.

She plugged the laptop in to charge and laid it on the secretary, grabbing her notepad and pencil to start her day’s list.

The kitchen shutters would be first, she thought as she walked to the dining room table and sat down, flipping to a new page and writing kitchen shutters at the top. She took a sip of coffee and flipped back to yesterday’s page to see what needed to be transferred over.

At first she didn’t understand what she was reading. Did she write that and forget? Was it about going out to get something?

Leave my house and what?  
Leave my house … leave my house …  
Why all caps?  
LEAVE MY HOUSE 

“Fuck!” She stood and backed away so fast her chair crashed to the floor. Stumbling, she kept going until her back hit the wall. She balled her hands into fists and tried not to shake. Her heart was hammering. 

“Shit, shit, shit,” she muttered as her eyes darted around. There was no way there was someone in this house. She had been here practically the whole time since she had moved in. She would have seen someone. Alex had cleared it herself. 

Kara slammed the side of one fist against the wall.  
“No!” She stepped into the middle of the room, furious, and shouted loud enough to echo, “I’m not going anywhere! Live with it!” 

Kara’s mind raced. She thought about the stuck bedroom door last night. What if someone really was in the house? She bounded up the stairs and to the master bedroom, gripping the knob and flinging the door open. Nothing. She checked the master bath, the wardrobe, the closet. 

She had to check the whole house again, right now. She ran up into the attic, looking in every corner and shadow. Then every room and closet on the second floor.  
____

Lena’s eyes opened. She could tell it was daylight. Doors were slamming in the house. What was Kara doing? Lena listened. Kara was searching. Every room. Lena suddenly recalled what she had written on Kara’s list and was filled with regret. 

She walked to the library door and unlocked it. Backing into a corner, she crouched down and focused to cloak herself, hoping that when the door opened sunlight wouldn’t pour in. 

Kara was coming down the stairs. The library was in the back corner of the house. A logical place to start. Footsteps. Determined. The door swung open, Kara burst in, her face awash in tears and her breath coming in short wet gasps. 

Shame compounded the regret, and Lena’s dead heart felt like lead in her chest. She lost focus and nearly decloaked as Kara brushed past her to check the storage cupboard by the small fireplace. Lena saw Kara’s face up close, skin pink and splotchy, stunning blue eyes shining with tears. 

She had taken someone full of life and joy and stronger than a tragedy that would define lesser people, and Lena Luthor, soulless demon that she was, had shattered her with three callous, selfish words. 

If the world were a fair place sun would have poured in and she would be cinders by now. But fate wouldn’t grant Lena that release. When Kara left the room Lena followed. The house was still shuttered and dark, lit only by electricity, but she could feel the power of the sunrise outside. 

Kara checked the other rooms and finally disappeared into the basement. 

Lena saw the overturned chair and the familiar notepad on the table. She hastily picked up the pencil and scratched through her last line. She wrote another then fled to the library as she heard the cellar door opening. 

She pulled the door shut behind her and locked it again, dropping the cloak with relief. 

There was pounding and the doorknob rattled. Lena sank onto the divan. She needed Kara to stop. She needed to rest. 

She focused again and gestured at the door, sending her intent to the molecular structure of porcelain, cast iron and steel, turning it icy cold.  
______

Kara jerked her hand away from the knob. It had gone so cold it almost burned. This wasn’t someone hiding in her house. This was definitely supernatural. She could only imagine the contorted, rational scientific explanations Alex would come up with if she told her about this. 

She just wished the ghost didn’t hate her so much. It hadn’t really done anything to harm her. But she knew her own presence was making it … her … was it Lena? … very unhappy. 

She walked slowly back to the dining room, the rush of adrenaline draining from her system. She picked up the chair. Her eyes fell to the notepad and took in the new words. In an elegant, precise cursive this time. 

_I’m sorry_  
_____

“Any progress on those property records today, Jess?” Sam asked that afternoon as she was getting ready to head home.  
“No, and it was the weirdest thing,” Jess replied.  
“What do you mean?”  
“The person I kept getting at the records office was giving me the runaround. Like excuse after excuse. She’d promise to call back when she had it pulled and not do it. I had to hound her all day. She finally told me the drawer was stuck, and I was like, are you fucking kidding me?” Jess shook her head and gave Sam a look of disbelief. “I might have to go down there and throw my weight around.”  
“Are you thinking subpoena?”  
“If we have to. I’ll do the prep work. How about you?”  
“Well Matthews is a piece of work. Something really stinks about this,” Sam said.  
“What’s next?”  
“I have a reply written for Ms. Luthor, but I don’t want to wait for the post office to get it back to her.”  
“Meaning …”  
“Ms. Luthor’s house isn’t too far from yours.”  
Jess scowled.  
_____

Late afternoon found Kara at the top of her ladder, with J’onn on another, each of them holding on to the last of the master bedroom shutters between them as the climbed carefully down in sync, one rung at a time. 

Kara had thrown herself into work, pushing that morning’s incident to the back of her mind. 

The newest message made her feel a little better but did nothing to relieve her unease about having a real live … well, not live … ghost. At least the spirit seemed a little less mad now. And Kara felt bad about yelling at her to ‘live with it.’ 

“Well, that certainly looks better,” J’onn said, pulling her from her thoughts. “You made good progress today.” 

“Thanks for letting me use your tools.” She had removed all of the ground floor shutters except the library’s, where an overgrown hedge would have to be cut back, and the ones from the master bedroom. Those alone would add a lot of light upstairs. 

J’onn had patched the hole in the eaves, removing the damaged wood and cutting a replacement to fit exactly. It would get painted later when other touch-ups were done.  
When he’d seen her working on the second story shutters he offered to help bring them down safely, and she had gratefully accepted. 

Together they carried the heavy shutter to the back of his truck. 

“Thank you for hauling these away, too, J’onn,” Kara said. 

“It’s good lumber. I’ll store it in my barn and salvage it later. I’m sure I’ll find a good use for it,” he said. She watched, bone tired, as he lowered both ladders and laid them down along the foundation at the back of the house. 

Kara’s phone rang in her pocket and J’onn waved goodbye and climbed into his truck to leave as she answered.

“Hey, Alex.”  
“What would you say to drinks and mounds of bar food with Vasquez and me tonight?”  
“That sounds exactly like what I need after today,” Kara said with a sigh.  
“Is everything ok?” Alex asked, concern evident in her voice.  
“Yeah, I think so. I just really need a break.”  
“We’ve got you covered then. And it’s my treat.”  
“You are literally the best sister ever,” Kara said.  
“I’m glad you finally recognize that. Meet us at The Alien in about an hour?”  
“Perfect,” Kara said.  
“Love you. See you soon.”  
“Love you too.”

They hung up and Kara trudged up the front steps. She was glad Alex had suggested The Alien. They had good food and she wouldn’t have to dress up, plus it was in walking distance. 

She went up to her bedroom to take off her grungy clothes. The hat box of letters was still on the floor by her bedside. Maybe she could read a few more tonight. She opened the cabinet door in her bedside table and placed the box in there so she wouldn’t stumble over it after the bar. For now she needed to shower and change and head out.  
_____

Jess Huang cursed the puppy dog eyes of Samantha Arias as she walked up the steps of what looked to her, for all intents and purposes, like the house from “Psycho.” Though, granted, it was evident that renovation work was underway. 

She knocked once, waited one minute, then knocked a second time and waited another minute. Her due diligence performed, she wedged Sam’s response letter between the screen door and the door jamb and returned to her car. 

Hopefully Norman or his mother would find it.  
_____

The envelope dropped to the threshold when Kara pushed open the screen door. She picked it up, and a chill ran through her when she saw who it was addressed to. It was from a law firm. She would have to put it in the mail and send it back tomorrow. For now she dropped it on the secretary and locked the door behind her. She _really_ needed a drink.  
_____

With the evening at hand, Lena emerged from the library once she’d heard Kara lock the door on her way out. Streaky padded up to her as if she had just been waiting for Lena’s attention. She picked up the cat and stroked her fur as she began what was now a nightly routine, seeing what Kara had done to her house. 

The shutters were gone. Room after room. All of them on the first floor except the library. She supposed she was lucky she wasn’t a pile of ashes after all. Some remained on the second floor, but her bedroom was uninhabitable now. 

And she supposed she couldn’t rely on the library anymore either. That left one dark corner in the attic and the cellar. 

She couldn’t help but notice that the place looked like someone lived here again. It was nice. There were small framed photos of Kara and Alex on the mantle. One with a group of friends. One with a couple of an age to be Kara’s parents, but she knew they couldn’t be since Kara was an adult in the photo. 

As home-like as the house felt, the situation was still untenable. She didn’t harbor any ill will toward the girl, but she refused to be stuck hiding in the rafters or the root cellar. She had two options as she saw it. Hide like a rat, or show herself and have it out with Kara. 

She sat at the dining room table and thought about how to do it as Streaky purred and warmed her lap.  
_____

“No, no, no, no, no. You can’t tell me that. I saw it. It was real,” Vasquez insisted.  
“That’s bullshit. Your mind just made up something to explain something it couldn’t understand,” said Alex.  
“Are you fucking kidding me? My mind made up a 12-foot _thing_ pushing a tree down _at me_? That’s an explanation?” Vasquez wasn’t having it.  
“I didn’t say it was a good one, but points for creativity. It was probably a microburst,” Alex said.  
Kara had brought up the topic of supernatural phenomena in an attempt to test the waters. Vasquez had jumped on it, and being a few beers in, was a little more loose lipped than usual about things that she and Alex had seen on the job.  
“What about that body that disappeared from the morgue that time?” Vasquez asked.  
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”  
“Bullshit!”  
“So, you think there are actual, you know, creatures and stuff out there?” Kara asked.  
“No way,” said Alex.  
“Absolutely,” said Vas.  
“What about ghosts?” Kara ventured.  
“Not a chance,” said Alex.  
“Who knows,” Vas offered. “I’m open to the possibility.”  
“How did you even get this job?” Alex asked incredulously.  
“How can you be so closed-minded when you have seen weird, unexplainable shit happen right in fucking front of you?” Vasquez slumped back against the booth seat.  
“I think ghosts might be real,” Kara said quietly.  
Alex, also a few beers in but with a higher tolerance than Vasquez, laughed. “Ha! What’s wrong? Ghost still tromping around your new rickety old house?”  
Vasquez’s interest was piqued. “What?! Have you heard stuff?”  
“Yeah, she hears a creaky fucking house creaking,” Alex said with a smirk.  
“I heard a laugh, and footsteps, and today a door closed by itself and the doorknob got, like, icy cold right in my hand,” she said, glad that Vasquez was on her side.  
“Cool!” Vas practically yelled.  
“Right?!” Kara replied.  
“Unbelievable,” Alex muttered.  
“But I think she doesn’t like me very much,” Kara said, picking at the label on her beer bottle.  
Alex rolled her eyes. “Oh, it’s a she now. Have you named it? Like, ha, Ghostie? Ha!” Alex snorted at her own joke. “No! Casper! No! Booooo Radley!”  
“Shut up,” Kara pouted. “I think it’s Lena Luthor.”  
Alex stopped laughing. Vasquez went still.  
“Luthor, as in Lex Luthor? The guy who went nuts before the ’29 stock market crash and killed, like 30 people?” Alex asked.  
_____

She wanted to get to know Kara before she decided if it was safe to let herself be known. Before she made any sentimental offers to let her to stay. And get to know her not by lurking and following her around like a creep, but by having actual conversations. Just popping up inside the house wouldn’t do, so she’d formulated a plan. 

She would introduce herself as a grad student writing a thesis on Lena Luthor. Kara would certainly buy that, considering she’d fallen for whatever sucker line that Matthews fellow sold her. She looked down at her black jeans, black boots, black draping scarf. She might need to update her wardrobe a little. This goth look was perfect for fading into the night, but not ideal if she wanted to play an earnest history buff.

There were boxes of her patent files and design sketches in the basement. Plenty of fodder to pretend to study. She could ask to rent a room. Kara was probably strapped for cash with the house purchase and the carpenter who had been banging around all day. 

All she needed was a student ID. 

She’d found the letter from the lawyers, or rather _a_ lawyer, Samantha Arias. “Looking into things,” wasn’t exactly inspiring, though the included book of postage stamps and emphasis on the suggestion that she call and clarify the living situation in the house had made her laugh. At least the lawyer confirmed that the deed to her home was still on file at their offices. 

She debated leaving the letter open on Kara’s desk but decided against it and filed it in the library desk drawer instead. Then she decided to take a walk and make an after hours visit to the registrar’s office. 

_____

Alex had called a car to take them all home, and they dropped Kara off first. She was glad for that because she was more than a little tipsy at this point. She held the hand rail carefully as she mounted the steps then lurched to the door and let herself in with minimal key fumbling. She needed to replace the bulb on the front porch.

She locked the door behind her and called out, “I’m hooo-ooome,” then let out a nasal laugh. Vasquez was fully convinced she had a ghost now and wanted to come see it and install cameras. _That_ wasn’t happening. Lena was _her_ ghost and she was pissed enough as it was without adding super sneaky-sneak spy surveillance. 

Everything seemed quiet now at least. She kicked off her shoes, then took off her shirt. And bra because it was bugging the crap out of her. She threw them both on the dining room table. She wandered into the kitchen for some water, which was excellent. This house had really good water. Then she needed to pee.

But first she was going to leave Lena a note.  
_____

Lena returned well before dawn with her new student ID. Creating a false record of her enrollment and transcripts had been a breeze, but making the little plastic card had taken some trial and error.

She was amused by the shirt and bra on the dining room table, as well as the slanting scrawl on the note pad that said, “Heeeeey, Lena. Be my friend please.” She couldn’t resist going up to Kara’s bedroom and taking a peek inside. 

The young woman was sprawled on the bed, topless. Her mouth was open and a rattling snore echoed off the high ceiling. Lena pulled the blanket over the girl, and then, in an impish impulse picked up her phone and unlocked it with the code she had watched Kara enter a hundred times. Lena took a picture of drunk-asleep Kara, a good close-up practically showing tonsils. 

Streaky rose from her nest on the bed and stretched, thumping onto the floor to follow Lena back down to the kitchen.

“What do you think, Streaky? Attic or cellar today?” Lena opened the cellar door and turned on the light at the top of the steps. She raised a disapproving eyebrow at the remnants of cobwebs dangling from the beams below. Streaky was equally unimpressed.  
_____

Kara woke to the sound of J’onn’s truck pulling in the driveway. She was grateful for the glass of water on her bedside table, though she had no recollection of bringing it up here. 

God, had she actually gone to bed topless with her jeans and belt still on? She vowed never to let Alex and Vasquez talk her into doing shots again. After a quick pitstop in the bathroom, she threw on some fresh clothes, and ran outside to get things sorted with J’onn. He was going to work on rewiring a few things and upgrading the breaker box in the basement today.  
_____

“Sam, I’m back, and the news isn’t good,” Jess said as she walked into the office.  
“What did you find?” Sam asked, coming out of her own office and joining Jess at the small conference table in their suite.

“The sale and purchase documents look legit. Kara Danvers paid $200,000 for the house that you and I know Lena Luthor still owns. Where it gets weird are these attachments that purport to use an adverse possession clause in the city planning code plus a bizarre and completely non-legal twist on a Writ of Fieri Facias to seize the property in the name of the county and then ‘sell’ it to one Mike Matthews for a song. He made a $190,000 profit,” Jess remarked with a scowl. What a turd bag.

“Let’s put our investigator on this guy. See what other properties he might have picked up and sold. And also how he targets his victims. We need to go talk Ms. Luthor, and Kara Danvers. Think they’ll both be home?” asked Sam.  
_____

Kara was taking laundry to her bedroom when she noticed Streaky with both front paws on the attic door. She paused and Streaky looked at her and gave her a plaintive meow. 

Kara didn’t want to go up there. She was embarrassed enough this morning to find her shirt and bra folded on the dining room table next to her drunkenly scrawled note.  
There was neat script beneath it again.  
_Buy me a drink next time and I’ll think about it._

“No, Streaky.”  
_Mmrrreerr_ Streaky flopped on her side and shoved a leg under the door. 

Maybe she could just open it a crack and listen. She moved Streaky gently away with her foot, held her breath and opened the door a sliver. Everything looked fine. Quiet. She opened it far enough to turn her ear to the top of the stairs and still keep an eye on things.

Streaky jumped over her foot and up the stairs.

“Streaky! No!” she hissed. She opened the door wider. “Streaky come back down here.” Streaky looked down at her from the top of the stairs, lifted her tail straight in the air and walked away. “Dammit!”

Kara crept to the top of the steps. Streaky was just a few feet away. She could almost reach her from there. The cat was looking up so Kara followed her gaze and jumped, nearly taking a step backwards and barely avoiding a fall down the stairs. 

Hanging from the ceiling was the biggest bat Kara had ever seen. It was at least eight or ten inches long. She looked over to where the hole had been in the eaves and she could see the board covering it was still in place.

She climbed the rest of the stairs as quietly as she could and pulled her phone from her back pocket, quickly flipping to the camera. She crept closer and closer to the bat. It was beautiful, and its wings were wrapped tight around its body. 

How did it get in? Had it been here the whole time? She looked below it and around on the floor. No droppings. 

She didn’t think bats in this area got this large. Maybe it was from South America. Or maybe it had been a stowaway on a freighter across the Pacific. She would try to get a really good shot and look online for a bat expert. 

She was just a few feet away as she took the photos. She lowered the camera and leaned a little closer.

 _Mmrrewwrr_  
She shot a glare at Streaky, the jerk.  
When she looked back up the bat’s eyes were open.  
“Gahh!!” She jumped back. She didn’t scream until the bat flew right at her.  
_____

Lena’s brain didn’t work the same when she was in her bat form. It couldn’t. If she thought like a human, or well, a vampire, it threw off the instincts she needed to fly and to use echolocation. She had developed a sort of heightened awareness over the years, though, that she possessed at all times. It helped her survive this long.

And something was wrong.

She opened her eyes only to be blinded by the light filling the attic. Something was in front of her. Predator. She flew for her exit, daylight be damned, she knew at least ten places with dark shelter nearby.

Then pain. Terrific pain.  
_____

The bat flew past Kara and straight into the wall where the hole had been sealed up. It dropped to the floor.

“Oh, no!” Kara gasped. It had to be hurt. She watched as it used its wings to flop over. It was making a hissing noise and crawling into the shadows. She looked around and seized a box of books, dumping out the contents. Streaky had bolted for the door at the first sign of trouble, of course.

Kara approached the bat slowly holding the box upside down. The creature was struggling and beating its wings.  
_____

Finally she caught enough air to get lift. She had to get back to her dark perch or down the stairwell. The exit was gone. Her head really fucking hurt and she could already feel the unpleasant aftereffect of her brief flight through sunlight. 

A shadow loomed in front of her and she tried to swoop past it, but the claws of one foot got tangled in something.

The something was shrieking.  
Lena shrieked back.

She was being flung in circles, centripetal force wrenching her foot. She beat her wings madly until she couldn’t hold her form anymore.  
_____

Yes, she was panicking, but a bat was caught in her hair. She didn’t think things could get any worse until she was suddenly pulled to the floor by her head and something started kicking at her.

She beat at it furiously with her hands. There was screaming and it wasn’t just her.  
“Stop thrashing, you fucking git!”  
Kara went deadly still. She was on her hands and knees with her head still pulled to the floor and something tangled in her hair.  
“Fuck, it burns!”  
Kara heard a popping rip and then her head was free and she was scrambling backwards on the floor and someone else was scrambling back into the shadows.

“What the fuck?” Kara yelled.  
“Get the fuck out!” the woman shouted back.  
“Fuck!”  
“Fuck off! Get out!”  
Kara almost went down the stairs head first but she managed to get her feet underneath her as she half stumbled, half fell down them as fast as she could, slamming and locking the door behind her.

She ran all the way out of the house and into the front yard.  
J’onn was beside his truck.  
“Kara, is everything ok?” he asked.  
“Yes! Fine!” she said. She wasn’t sure why. It was not fine. Nothing was fine.  
“Did something get caught in your hair?” he asked.  
She reached up and touched something metal in the severely tangled mess.  
“Um, yeah. I was just about to get it out. It’s fine. I’ve got it.”  
“Ok. I was going to pick up a few things that I need to finish up today. Do you need anything while I’m out?”  
“Nope,” she said, shoving her hands in her pockets. What the fuck was she going to do? “I just needed some air. Sure is nice out today.”  
J’onn looked at her oddly but didn’t remark on her strange behavior.  
“Ok. I’ll be back in about thirty minutes,” he said as he got in the truck and turned the ignition.  
Kara waved him away and went back inside the house. 

First she made sure Streaky wasn’t still in the attic somehow. Then she went to the bathroom and carefully extracted a metal buckle from her hair, in the end having to cut it in a few places to get it out. And then she went back to the attic door.  
“Who are you?” she yelled.  
“Piss off!” came the reply.  
“I’m calling the police!” Kara yelled.  
“I fucking dare you! You stole my house!”  
“I am! I’m doing it right now,” she yelled, feeling dread as she patted her empty pockets.  
“Really? Because your phone is up here,” came the reply.

Kara paced in a circle.  
“Look, if you’re homeless, we can talk about it, ok? We can find a place for you to stay. I can help you out!  
_____

Lena’s hands were burned, as was the underside of her chin and one side of her jaw and her ear. It stung like a motherfucker. And she’d had to tear the buckle off one of her boots. She loved these boots.

“I’m not fucking homeless! My lawyers are going to fucking throw you out and then you’ll be homeless, you bloody cunt!” Really it was the pain talking. She didn’t mean it. But she’d just had the shit scared out of her and been bloody half broiled in the sun and she was pissed.

There was quiet for a while. Blissful quiet.  
“Do you need a water?” came the voice from below. A voice she’d grown a fond of up until the yelling part.  
“What?”  
“It gets hot in the attic. Do you need water?”  
“No, I don’t need fucking water.” Lena laughed. Kara had just witnessed her go from bat to full-fledged smoking-in-the-sun vampire, and she wanted to know if she needed a water. It was difficult to stay angry at that.

“Look, I don’t know how long you’ve been hiding here, but this is my house now. I’m not going anywhere.”  
“Well neither am I,” Lena called down.  
“Can I have my phone back, please.”  
Was she fucking kidding?  
Lena wrapped her scarf around her hand and quickly reached out into the sun patch to grab the phone. She unlocked it and turned on the forward facing camera. God, she looked rough. She composed a nice one with her scowling face, eyebrow raised, middle finger up. She flung it toward the stairwell.  
“Come and get it, Kara,” she yelled.

“Who the fuck are you?”  
“I’m Lena fucking Luthor!” Lena screamed.  
There was a moment of silence, then the door below was flung open and feet bounded up the stairs. Barely the top of a dark blonde head showed, peeking above floor level with a flash of eyes meeting Lena’s own, and then a hand darting to snatch the phone off the floor. Just as quickly she was gone.

Lena sagged against the wall in the shadows. That could’ve gone better. Her hands and face fucking hurt. She should have taken the water. Not that it would really help. She would have to feed to heal. She couldn’t fly now, so there was really only one person she could think of to go to.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is not exactly what I planned to happen next, but this is what happened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone for reading and for the amazing comments. I’m so glad people are enjoying this as much as I’m enjoying writing it. 
> 
> As far as I can tell, Nan Hudson wasn’t really a portrait painter, but I liked the idea of her and Ethel Sands coming from France to do Lena’s portrait.
> 
> Wishes for safety to everyone in Hurricane Michael's path.

There was a woman locked in her attic. A woman who was also a bat. That really wasn’t possible. She didn’t see what had happened exactly, but first there was a bat, and then a woman. Was she hallucinating? Were there hallucination-inducing mold spores in her house?

She had pics. She pulled her phone from her pocket and bobbled it with shaking hands in her effort to unlock it and get to her photos. 

That was her! Flipping her off, yes, but that was definitely who she’d seen. She was pale. Beautiful, even making a face. And her eyes were breathtaking. Something was wrong with her hand. It was weirdly red on parts while the rest was pale. Kara swiped the phone. There were the bat photos. There was definitely a bat. She swiped through them and stopped when she saw her own face. She dropped the phone.

Her heart was pounding. She picked up the device and looked at the date and time stamp. It had been taken that morning around 3:00 a.m. She fought back panic and tried to think. Lena, or the bat-woman who thought she was Lena, was in her bedroom while she was passed out after her night at the bar. 

She could have hurt Kara if she’d wanted to. She just took a picture. And she folded Kara’s clothes and left the note that was kind of flirty. And she might have left the water on her bedside table.

She thought about her conversation with Vasquez and Alex the night before. Vas had said something about shape shifters. Could Lena Luthor be a slow-aging person-bat shape shifter?  
Then Kara remembered the letters.

She ran into her bedroom and pulled the box from the cabinet. She carefully removed them and laid them on the bed, keeping them in the order they were stored as best as she could. There was a second layer under the first, and with them a diary.

She stacked the letters back in the box and took everything down to the dining room.

She also took two bottles of water from the fridge and set them on the attic stairs, calling up to let the woman know they were there but getting no answer.  
_____

Jan. 1, 1929

_Lex is being a weasel and banging pots outside my door. Joke’s on him, I wasn’t nearly as sotted at the party as he thinks I was, but it’s still annoying. I hope he gives himself a headache. Happy New Year, loving brother._

Jan. 29

_I had a lovely ride at sunset with Mina to our special spot. Lord she gets me wound up. I wish she didn’t get that little look of guilt every time afterward. So what if she’s married. It’s not like she’ll wind up with child. Heaven knows she loves it, seeing as she shouts to the heavens, and loud. It was dark by the time we got back._

_When we came down for dinner, imagine our surprise when Lex showed up to table in a robe. Mother has always insisted we dress for dinner and it was quite fun seeing her hold back a tidal wave of a fit because he’s her perfect boy. My amusement didn’t last long as he was in a foul mood and wouldn’t eat anything. I was embarrassed that Mina had to see that._

Feb. 4

_The house is chaos. Two of the servants have gone anemic from some sort of animal bite and mother has had the groundskeeper turn some of his terriers loose in the house to try to run down whatever vermin is doing it. I saw the bite on Clara’s neck and it looks to be a vicious foul thing whatever it is._

_I start sitting for Nan Hudson tomorrow for the traditional Luthor portrait. I was surprised mother wanted to commission it. I agreed to sit for an oil if I could pick the artist (with Lillian’s approval) and get a photographic portrait done as well. Mother doesn’t believe photography is art, but I am fascinated. So Nan arrives from France tomorrow, with her partner Ethel Sands, and I have a feeling we’ll be great friends. I’ve written to Fannie Johnston to see if she would consider doing the photograph._

_I do hope the dogs are still tearing around the house while the portrait process begins. I haven’t laughed so much in my life as I have since they came inside._

Feb. 14

_It hasn’t been much of a Valentine’s Day. Both servants, Clara and Dale, succumbed to their illness. The dogs found no unusual rats and they’ve been taken back to the kennels. The household is in mourning._

_I did send Mina a trinket that she will love and Jonathan won’t notice, along with a note of sweet nothings._

_Mother suggested we go to the country home early to get away from whatever plagues the house, or until it is found out. Strangely, Lex refuses. He won’t even hear of us going without him. He stays locked up all day now and only leaves his room at night. He keeps the heavy drapes drawn to block the sun, and from outside it looks as if he’s stuck black paper on the glass with paste. It is all exceedingly odd._

_Most curious is his loss of interest in the market. He used to be so keen on it. Now he says it’s done._

_The portrait is going well. Nan gives me the most brilliant prompts to inspire my expression. ___

Kara set the diary down. The paintings. 

She dashed to the storage closet off the nook under the stairs and pulled open the door. She tugged on the large wooden box until it began to slide and she moved it out into the center of the foyer. The crate was more like a protective framework and not completely enclosed, and there were thick, protective woolen sleeves over each painting. 

She retrieved her hammer from the toolbox under the sink and borrowed a pry bar from J’onn. In a few minutes she had opened the top and lifted four paintings out. They were big, at least four feet tall. 

The first she uncovered showed a rather stern yet strikingly beautiful woman standing behind a man seated at a massive desk, which stretched out beside them both. He held a monocle in one hand and a fountain pen in the other and he was completely bald. The open book on the desk looked like a ledger, and there were a few other objects on it that were probably symbolic of their lives or their wealth. 

The next image was a young man, probably in his twenties, looking gallant and carefree. His suit was impeccable, his hair lush and expression rakish. 

The third showed a couple, the same as the first but younger with a boy included in the portrait, possibly 12 or 13 years old. 

Then she came to the last portrait, and as she began to lift the cover the first thing she noticed were riding boots, with blue-blacks used in the dark shadows. Then tan riding pants with leather at the knees. She pulled the cover the rest of the way off. It was Lena. Pale, the eyebrow raised, the riveting green eyes. 

How was Lena Luthor still alive and young? Her first thought was that it for sure wasn’t a Dorian Gray situation because this portrait was amazing. 

Her second thought was, No. Vampires aren’t real. 

There was a knock at the door. J’onn. She opened it. 

“Hi,” she said.  
“I was just packing up for the day and wanted to let you know I was leaving,” he said. “Everything is progressing nicely. I have a couple more things to do in the cellar tomorrow. Then I’ll get to the plumbing and the touch-up paint. I think a few more days will do it.”  
“That’s great! Kara replied,” though her thoughts really couldn’t be any further from home repairs than they were right now.  
“See you in the morning, Kara,” J’onn said.  
“Bye.” 

Kara closed the door and returned to the paintings. Streaky had climbed through the slats of the crate and claimed the wooden box for herself, tail switching. 

Kara compared the portrait to the picture on her phone. She looked up to the attic door on the second floor landing. Lena Luthor was in her attic. Or her identical great grandchild. Or her clone. Or a vampire. 

In the portrait Lena’s jacket was a deep, dark emerald mixed with dark blues. Her eyes were a different green altogether, like jade in sunlight. Her pose was bold, like the suggestion of the raised brow. She was leaning toward the artist, an elbow on the foremost knee, a riding crop clasped casually in that hand, the other boot tucked slightly behind. The other arm stretched behind her, resting on the back of the chair, as if to say she would take all the time in the world that she damn well pleased, and you, the viewer, would wait with your heart pounding in anticipation. 

It was powerful. Enticing. Challenging. Sexy.  
She should probably go up there and check on her. While it was still daylight. 

There was a knock on the door.  
Kara tore her eyes away from the portrait and opened the door. Two women in nice suits stood on her porch.  
“Can I help you?”  
“Are you Kara Danvers?”  
_____ 

Forty minutes later Kara was fighting back tears again. Samantha Arias and Jessica Huang, of Masters, Marsden, Pendlay and Huang, had tried to break it to her gently that she had given all of the money she’d been holding on to since her parents’ death to a sleazebag who fake-sold her a house he didn’t actually own. It was like the old joke about a bridge for sale. She felt so stupid and embarrassed. She had cried a little but managed to pull it together. 

“That was everything I had. Everything,” she told Sam and Jess.  
“We understand, Ms. Danvers. And Ms. Luthor has instructed us to bring the full force of everything we’ve got down on Mr. Matthews, but our investigator reported that he has more debt than assets. The $200,000 that you paid him may already be gone,” Sam said. 

Tears started flowing silently down Kara’s face. “Please don’t kick me out,” she implored. 

“Ms. Danvers, we understand how bad this is for you, and we’ll try to work with you here, but Ms. Luthor specifically instructed us to have you removed from the property,” Jess said, though even she was not immune to the tears. 

“That leads me to one other thing we need to ask you about, Ms. Danvers,” Sam … said.  
“Kara. Please just call me Kara,” she said.  
“In her letter to us, Ms. Luthor said that she was in the house and eluding detection. Have you seen anyone? Or anything that might indicate there has been someone here with you?” 

Kara laughed in a burst of unexpected and somewhat manic energy. “Nooooo,” Kara says, trying to sound sincere. She hated lying. But then she couldn’t help laughing again. Everything was so unreal right now. She felt like she was cracking into pieces. 

A sort of shwooping thunk noise came from the attic.  
Three sets of eyes shot up.  
“Are you sure?” Jess said, looking at her so intensely Kara felt like she might incinerate.  
“Do you mind if we go see what that was with you?” Sam asked, but it wasn’t really a question. “Just to be sure.”  
“Ummmmm,” said Kara. 

“Let’s go,” said Sam, headed for the stairs. As they skirted around the paintings, the portrait caught Sam’s eye and she stopped dead in her tracks. “Wow. Who is that?”  
Kara cleared her throat. “I … I, um … I think that’s Lena Luthor, in 1929.”  
Sam did some quick math in her head. “Strangely, I think this whole thing might make a little more sense. I can see how the woman who posed for that could still be alive and kicking at 115.”  
“A 115 years old?” Kara asked, amazed. 

Jess moved into Kara’s personal space, “What aren’t you telling us, Ms. Danvers?”  
Kara looked out the front windows. The sun had fully set and it was dark now. “Will you come with me to check upstairs first?” she asked. 

Sam and Jess both nodded, and they proceeded to the attic. Jess and Sam both noted the implication of two untouched bottles of water on the stairs. If someone was up there, Kara Danvers knew about it or at the very least suspected it. When they ascended the steep steps, however, all they found was a mostly empty attic with an open window and some books scattered across the floor. 

“Oh my gosh!” Kara exclaimed, running to the window and leaning out to look below. There was light spilling onto the side lawn from the kitchen windows, clearly showing no crumpled body below. When she turned back to the room, both Jess and Sam were staring at her, arms crossed and more intimidating than any vampire.  
“Let’s go back downstairs,” Kara said, closing the window. She really wasn’t sure how she was going to explain this. Or whether the lawyers would try to have her committed to a mental health facility once she did. 

“Are you trying to tell us you think a 115-year-old woman jumped out of your attic window?” Jess asked, trying to reiterate what she thought the young woman was trying to say as they descended to the foyer.  
“Yes and no. She may be 115, but she still looks like that,” Kara said, pointing to the painting.  
Jess and Sam exchanged a look.  
“I can prove it,” Kara said, pulling her phone from her pocket and opening the photos. “Look at the scar next to her eye.”  
_____ 

This is not how Sam thought her evening was going to go. 

“Tell us again,” Sam said, trying to sound gentle and encouraging.  
“Look, I know it sounds like I’m making up a story and I’ve lost my mind, but I’ve been hearing things in the house. And this morning I went up and there was the big bat hanging from the ceiling. The next thing I know it’s flying around, gets caught in my hair, and then there’s _no bat_ and instead there’s _her._

“I dropped my phone, I ran. I came back. I asked for the phone back. That photo was on it. You can see it was taken today.”  
Sam and Jess exchanged looks in silent communication.  
“Do you mind giving us the room?” Sam asked.  
Kara was surprised by the question. “Oh … uh … ok,” she said and stepped out onto the front porch. 

“What the hell kind of Twilight Zone episode did Pendlay hand us?” Sam asked Jess as soon as she was fairly certain they couldn’t be overheard.  
“It doesn’t matter,” Jess said. “We lock that door right now, call the Sheriff’s office, have her evicted, and we’re done. Fuck this bat nonsense. We get her out now and go,” Jess said.  
“Is that really the kind of person you want to be?” Sam hissed.  
“No, but I don’t want to get sucked into this either,” Jess replied.  
“Jess, this is the most fascinating, wtf moment we will ever have in our entire careers. We can live off this story for decades. You’re telling me you don’t want to get to the bottom of it?”  
“Of course I want to find out what’s going on, but you know what I don’t want? I don’t want to get bitten by a giant rabid bat! Which is probably what happened to Danvers!” 

“That picture on her phone is Lena Luthor,” Sam insisted.  
“We don’t know where that painting came from. It could be an elaborate hoax,” Jess said.  
“Oh sure, let’s do an incredibly beautiful oil portrait, aged appropriately and corroborated by the diary, to convince some lawyers to throw me out of my house because I started talking about vampires. Where is the win for Danvers in that? What’s the hoax?”  
Sam did have Jess stumped with that.  
“Look, she’s obviously invested in this house. We’ll communicate with Luthor …” Sam started.  
“By sending her a letter at this address?” Jess asked.  
“What happened to the letter?” Sam wondered. She went to the front door and opened it. “Kara, did you receive a letter to Ms. Luthor from us?”  
“Yeah. I didn’t open it, I swear. I left it on the secretary. Come to think of it, I haven’t seen it since last night,” she said. 

“Is there somewhere, if you were vampire Lena Luthor and wanted to put it away, that you would file it?” Sam asked.  
“Yes. The library desk,” Kara said, lighting up. “There are papers already there that I haven’t had time to look through, and that door has been mysteriously stuck shut already once. I didn’t even tell you about the doorknob turning icy cold in my hand!” Kara stepped back inside and strode into the library with Jess and Sam following. She opened the top drawer and pulled out the letter.  
“I swear to you I did not open this, and I did not put it here,” she said solemnly. 


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, thank you for all the kudos and kind comments. Every one means so much, and I get so excited reading them. I am just as enthusiastic for these two as you are.

In the microsecond when she realized someone was sitting in the dark in her apartment, Leslie Willis’ heart slammed into her fucking tonsils. As soon as her eyes adjusted she realized who it was.

“Hey, Spooky. It’s been a while.” She turned on the overhead light. Lena squinted and turned her face away from it, exposing the burns on her face and ear.  
“You ok? You look like shit,” Leslie said. She put her things down, turned on a small lamp by the sofa and shut off the overhead.  
Lena leaned forward, showing her burned hands, curled stiff from the pain.

Leslie kicked off her boots, then reached under her loose tee and unfastened her bra, pulling the straps through the sleeves and over her arms one at a time, throwing it on another chair nearby. She sat sideways on the sofa, facing Lena.

“Come over here. Your kink doesn’t scare me.”  
Of course Leslie knew it wasn’t a kink. Yeah, it had kind of surprised her the first time, when she figured out what was going on. And what Lena was. But she got it. She played along. And every once in a while, Lena showed up. 

Lena was grateful for someone who didn’t ask questions. She went to Leslie, perhaps with a little more speed than she had intended as the woman gasped beneath her. Her fangs extended and she bent to the woman’s throat, gently feeling for the spot she needed and setting the points to flesh. Another gasp.  
“Hey, can a girl get a couple minutes of foreplay?”  
Lena drew back just enough to whisper something she wouldn’t admit to anyone else.  
“It hurts,” she rasped.  
“Ok, Spooky. Take what you need.”  
Livewire was no fool. And she was kinder than she would want people to know.  
As soon as the blood began to coat Lena’s tongue, she could feel the process of healing begin, and the rush of life coursing through her body.  
_____

“So where is she now?” Jess asked.  
“I think she goes out at night sometimes,” Kara said. “And I think she was hurt. Now that I know she … is what she is … I think the sunlight in the attic burned her.” She looked up toward the attic. “Maybe I should open the window back up. I’m pretty sure the hole my contractor patched up is how she used to get in and out.”  
“Then yes, to prevent our client from burning up in the sun, go open the window,” Sam directed.  
Kara got up and bounded up the stairs, returning quickly.

The three sat around the dining room table. Jess was researching Luthor history on her laptop. The letters and diary were on the table. A debate about whether they should read more than Kara already had was ongoing. Sam had pointed out that if Lena Luthor was, indeed, still alive … in a way … they didn’t have the right to read her papers and diary. Jess argued that they needed more information. Kara suggested leaving a note for Lena, as she had been doing, asking if they could all talk.

“I found something,” Jess said. “It took some digging to find a reputable source, but it seems all the weirdo murder fan sites are mostly accurate.”

“So what happened?” Sam asked.  
“Lex Luthor started to exhibit a sort of mania, locking himself in a dark room all day and only coming out at night. Sometimes he was his old cavalier self, at others he was nasty, cruel, ranting. People around him began to die. Servants first. Then neighbors. Finally young women and men from the poor areas, vulnerable people, whose deaths would have gone unnoticed if not for how they died.” Jess looked up at her audience.  
“Loss of blood, in one way or another. There was the unchecked anemia. Some had had arteries opened with surgical incisions. And some had basically had their throats torn open.”

Kara shuddered. “Poor Lena.”

“We don’t know how Lena ties into all this,” Jess said. “For all we know she was complicit. That’s why we need more information.”

“What happened to Lex?” Sam asked.  
“Lex and Lillian Luthor died in a suspiciously contained boiler explosion and fire. It would have been even more suspicious if the servants, who all survived, weren’t able to corroborate that Lex and Lillian, of their own volition, had begun insisting on sleeping in the cavernous cellar under the mansion, having furniture and art moved to the underground level and having the few above-ground windows in their new living space painted black.”

“Where was Lena?” Sam asked.  
“She was sleeping off a bender at a friend’s house,” Jess said.  
“Mina?” asked Kara.  
“Yes,” said Jess. “The home of Mina and Jonathan Harker.”

“We need to know what happened to her before we talk with her,” Jess insisted. “We don’t know who we’re dealing with. Kara’s interactions aren’t enough to go on.”  
“I don’t know,” said Sam. “There’s a line I don’t want to cross.”  
“I have a suggestion,” Kara said. “I’ve already read some of it, and I flipped through the whole thing once. She made entries almost every day, but then there’s a big gap in time before it resumes.”

“What’s your suggestion?” Sam asked.  
“I’ll read the last entry before the gap, and the one after it. If it’s relevant information, I’ll share it. If not, I’ll keep it to myself, and then the invasion of privacy is just on me,” she said quietly. She was willing to take on that burden. She was confident that Lena wasn’t dangerous, but Jess was assuming she was. If they didn’t find out more, she was worried about what would happen to Lena when she got back.

“Ok,” said Sam. “I’ll go for that.”  
“No way,” said Jess. “I don’t trust you to know what’s relevant or to tell us if what you read is something you don’t want us to know. I’ll read over your shoulder.”  
_____

Sept. 15

 _I can’t take this insanity anymore. Lex and mother’s actions of late are inexplicable. Lex keeps muttering about “protecting me too,” and I have no idea what he means by that, but it scares me. I’ve packed a trunk and I’m going to tell them I want to go take a little vacation at the bungalow I bought a few years ago. I will stay there until I see evidence that they have returned to normal or that I need to do something more. I don’t know what even could be done other than having them committed to an asylum, and that would be my last resort._  
_____

“So she’s trying to flee,” said Sam.  
“She doesn’t say anything about the murders,” said Kara.  
“The investigators didn’t put it together until after Lex’s death,” said Jess. “We don’t know how much she knew.”  
“Let me read the next one,” Kara said.  
“Read it aloud,” said Sam.  
_____

Dec. 29, 1929

_It’s been a long time since I thought about my diary. I found it when I was unpacking the few boxes of things I had shipped from the family home. I don’t owe it to anyone to write down an explanation of what I’ve become. But I suppose if something does end me, I’d like it to be known what happened, and what I’ve done._

_I won’t write down what Lex did to me other than to say it was unspeakable and wretched. When I finally felt somewhat myself again, he began what he called “training me.” Each new discovery was its own nightmare._

_He showed me his fangs and taught me how to extend my own at will and not just when I was desperate for sustenance._

_He showed me what it felt like for sunlight to hit my bare flesh. I won’t ever forget the burning and the stench. He held my hand in it until the skin turned crisp and then he threw a bound and terrified woman at me and told me to drink. I did. I will never forgive him for that._

_He taught me to sense the approach of sunrise and sunset._

_And he taught me how to transform my body—into a whisp or into a bat—and how to fly._

_I learned how to cloak myself on my own, and I refused to show him how. He was furious, so jealous that I could make my body unseen and keep my consciousness in the room, even my ability to move things. He said he gave me eternal life and he could take it away just as easily. So I started finding other places to rest during the day when I am most vulnerable._

_I wouldn’t feed the way Lex did, taking violently without consent, nor as frequently. I am still experimenting, but there seems to be a cycle to it all. I seek a balance. All Lex wanted was power._

_At first I kept up my friendship with Mina, but then I began to worry for her safety. If she harbored me, Lex could come after her. She wasn’t afraid for herself, but she conceded when I pointed out that he might go after her family as well._

_She is the one who helped me get to National City safely. There is no means of passage that allows one to travel only at night from one coast to the other, other than perhaps unreliable motor vehicles or horseback. It was just far too risky. But I had to get away. It was Mina who had the idea for the box._

_It was Lex and Lillian’s threats that made my mind up. They sought to control me, bend me to their will and their ways, and I wouldn’t do it. I would wait until Lex and Lillian went out for their evening hunt and work in my little lab at the house. It was a good bit of experimentation to find just the right mix of chemicals, the right stabilizer, the catalyst, the means to direct the energy, but I did it._

_So one night, after Lex and Lillian went out, I set my trap in the basement. Then I went out to a few clubs in town, each more disreputable than the last, pretending to get drunk. Everyone who saw me would be gossiping about it the next day, or so I thought. I noisily beat on Mina’s door before sunrise, waking the servants, slurred my way to the bedroom she had prepared for me, and laid down to “sleep it off.”_

_The boiler exploded around one in the afternoon, setting off a few strategically placed additional points of ignition I had devised. None of the staff were hurt._

_That day was Black Tuesday on Wall Street. Quite a bit of luck for me. The story of the fire and the deaths of Lex and Lillian Luthor were buried and society, so rocked by the crash, didn’t seem to notice._

_No one suspected the explosion was intentional, and I handled the planning and execution of services and burial. There were remains. I hadn’t been certain there would be. I did something, however, to ensure neither of them would rise, but I won’t put it to paper._

_I will write this, however. I willfully murdered my brother and my step mother, though they weren’t in fact alive at the time. I wouldn’t leave them to continue their reign of bloodshed and death._

_And then I said goodbye to my dearest Mina. I lied to her and promised I would come back. And she nailed me into a sturdy, padded box and shipped me by train to National City, where I’d had Masters, Marsden and Pendlay arrange for pickup and delivery to my home there._

_I will make a home, or something like it, and plan what to do next from here. It’s odd to know I have lifetimes ahead of me. For now I must protect the only person I love and trust by staying away. Even association with a Luthor is anathema now that Lex’s murders are uncovered._  
_____

Sam stood and pulled a business card from her purse and handed it to Kara. “I’m still not completely sure this is real, but if Lena Luthor still exists, alive or not, we still work for her,” she said. “Leave your note. See if she’ll talk with us,” Sam continued as she pulled an envelope out of her purse. She took a letter from the envelope and dug for a pen. Jess handed her one. She added a note to the letter, returned it to the envelope and sealed it. She wrote Lena’s name on the outside. “And leave this for her. Call me if you get a response. We’ll be back regardless.”

“Thank you for not kicking me out yet,” Kara said.  
“It’s still in Ms. Luthor’s hands,” Sam said. “But we’ll try to work with you as best as we can.”  
“Goodnight,” said Jess.  
“Goodnight,” Kara said before closing the door.  
_____

Kara flopped down on the old Davenport, stroking Streaky thoughtfully when the cat jumped on her belly. She could barely wrap her mind around everything that had happened that day. She fell asleep on the couch.  
_____

It was three in the morning when Lena walked in the back door, burns healed. She found the note and the envelope on the dining room table. 

The hatbox was sitting there. She had almost forgotten about it. Tokens of her last year of life. Tears sprang to her eyes. For a moment she was furious. Kara had no right. Lena had hidden it, even from herself, for a reason. 

She didn’t need the letters anymore. Every one was burned into her damned soul. 

The flirtatious sly ones from the early days of Mina’s marriage and before.

The passionate ones, begging her to keep their secret even as she declared her love and desire for the thing Lena had become after the change.

The concern filled pages, asking where she’d gone, why she didn’t reply anymore.

The sad and reckless ones later on, written in a way that told Lena that Mina thought they would never be read. They were more like diary entries with stories about Mina’s children and grandchildren, revealing her true feelings about her life and her world, the thoughts and moments she said she wished Lena had been there to share.

Mina had sent her last in her eighties. She saw death coming and wanted to say goodbye.

Lena wasn’t angry anymore. She couldn’t fault Kara for reading the diary after what she’d seen this morning.

Lena read Kara’s note again.

_Lena,_  
_Your lawyers came to the house. You were right, the house isn’t mine. I was tricked. I’m sorry I invaded your safe space and changed everything. I was hoping we could talk. Would that be ok?_  
_Kara_

And she looked at the note from Sam Arias scribbled on the more formal letter.

_If you want her gone, we can make that happen. Kara seems like a nice person, though, and this puts her in a tough spot. If you would like to consider a compromise, we can negotiate that for you as well. Jess Huang and I would be happy to meet with you at your convenience to discuss how you want to handle the situation. — Sam Arias ___

She looked over to where Kara slept. It had been a long time since she’d really talked to anyone. Or had a friend. 

She walked over to her, touched the warm shoulder and gently shook it. 

“Kara, wake up.” 


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge huge thanks to everyone who has left such encouraging and wonderful comments and kudos. I hope this chapter meets expectations. It feels right to me. 
> 
> If any artists want to do a commission of this AU pair, let me know. I'm moving soon and need some art for my walls. (Twitter and Tumblr info in my profile.)

“Kara, wake up.” 

This wasn’t how Lena had planned to do things, but as with her entire life, things didn’t always go to plan. 

“Alex?” Kara murmured.  
“No, it’s Lena.”  
The woman stiffened, then in a swift move twisted and shuffled into a sitting position back against the arm of the sofa. She was startled but not frightened. Lena could feel the difference. She sat down, perched on the edge of the cushion. 

“Lena?”  
“Yes.”  
“You’re really Lena Luthor?”  
“Yes.”  
“Are you really 115 years old?” Kara asked, then looked like she regretted it.  
“Well, I stopped celebrating birthdays but that sounds about right.”  
Kara’s face changed from half asleep to sadness and empathy.  
“No birthdays?”  
Lena smiled, tilted her chin and raised a brow.  
“Sorry,” Kara shook her head slightly, resetting. “Hi, I’m Kara.” She offered a hand.  
Lena took it, briefly. “I know. We’ve met,” Lena said, her voice deep, a little teasing.  
“I wanted to try it again with less yelling,” Kara said softly. “Sorry, I’m still a little asleep I think.”

“You said you wanted to talk,” Lena said. “Let’s talk.”  
Kara chuckled. “Yeah. I thought you’d leave me a ghost note again.”  
“Well, you were right here,” Lena said. “I thought you might’ve been waiting for me.”  
“I didn’t mean to sleep on the couch. I was exhausted I guess.” She rubbed at her eyes with the heels of her hands.  
Lena smiled once more. There was just something endearing about this woman.  
“Yes, me too.”

“Are you okay?” Kara exclaimed, suddenly remembering. “I thought you were burned,” she said, looking to Lena’s hands.  
“I took care of it,” Lena said.  
“How?” Kara asked, curiosity lighting her face.  
“I don’t think our relationship is at that level of information yet, Kara,” Lena said.

“Oh. Right. Of course,” Kara said. “Do you mind if I turn on a light?”  
“I’d rather not. I prefer this,” Lena said. She pointed to the windows, “With the shutters down there’s a lot of moonlight coming in. Your eyes will adjust.”

“I’m sorry about all the shutters,” Kara said, looking down. “And just moving into your house. That must’ve felt like such an invasion of your home.”  
“It did. And it was,” Lena said simply.

“The thing is, I don’t have anything left. If I leave here, I’ll to have to move in with my sister and start from nothing. I was wondering if …” Kara paused, steeling herself for a difficult conversation, “if there’s anything I could do to convince you to let me stay.”

“Just what are you offering?” Lena asked, crossing one leg over the other and leaning in, unable to resist the unintentional implication. She chided herself for it as soon as she realized what she was doing. Most of her interactions with mortals for at least the last twenty years had been superficially charming strangers into inviting her into their homes. The habit was hard to break apparently.

Kara blushed, visible even in the dark. She didn’t have her glasses on, and Lena could see the vibrant blue of her eyes. Astonishing.  
“Oh … um,” Kara began, a little uneasy.  
“I apologize,” Lena said quickly. “I was teasing, and we don’t really know each other that well either.”  
Kara huffed a little laugh. “Well, you have seen me passed out after a night at a bar and brought me some water. That was nice.”  
Lena's mind flashed to what she had seen that night, but she decided not to remark on it. 

“Tell me, why did you want _this_ house?” Lena asked.  
Kara blinked a couple times and then a beaming smile spread across her face. Lena was captivated.  
“It’s so beautiful. And it looked like all it needed was some love. And it practically had a whole museum of fascinating stuff in perfect condition inside. It kind of spoke to me.”

“And of course you didn’t know it also included a vampire in residence,” Lena said.  
“No,” admitted Kara, twisting her hands in her lap. “Is that what you like to be called? Vampire?”  
Lena was puzzled by the question.  
“I’ve always sort of despised it, but what else is there to call it?”  
“I did some searching, when I realized you might be a …,” Kara halted. “Hemovore is an option,” she suggested. 

“Hemovore?”  
“Yes, so it just refers to your dietary restriction without all the lore and stigma that goes along with the other one,” Kara said. She laughed quietly and continued, “Sort of like vegan, but really really not.”  
Lena laughed out loud for the first time in ages. “I’ll think about it.”

Kara moved around on the couch to straighten and sit more upright, legs crossed and tucked in front of her, giving Lena more room to sit as well. The pale woman drew one leg up with an ankle hooked under her knee and perched her arm on the back of the couch, her head resting in that hand.

“What do you want?” Lena asked.  
With an intake of breath, Kara straightened and held her shoulders back and chest up. “I wanted this to be a place of my own. To bring it back to life. To get a fresh start for myself.”

“Why the fresh start?” Lena asked.  
“I feel like I’ve been holding back. Staying in a safe zone instead of taking a leap. I think … I think I’ve been letting fear hold me back,” she said.  
“Fear of losing everything again?” Lena asked gently. Kara’s eyes widened. Lena nodded toward her letters and journal on the table in the next room. “You looked into my personal life. I’ve also looked into yours.” She got up and retrieved the diary and came back, sitting down and flipping through the pages.

“How?” asked Kara.  
“I poked through your laptop, your photos, documents. I stopped when I learned about what happened with your parents.”  
Kara seemed to get even smaller.  
“I’m sorry you experienced that,” Lena said quietly. “I’m sorry to have reminded you of it.”  
Kara shook her head. “I’m reminded all the time. It’s part of me.” 

Kara lifted her eyes and noticed that her vision had gotten better in the dim light of night. The moon outside was so bright it cast shadows from the trees. She could see the smoothness of Lena’s pale skin and the brilliant green of her eyes. She felt an unexpected spark of attraction deep inside. 

Lena lifted the diary in her hands. “Can we make an agreement not to do that anymore? This is personal. I don’t want anyone reading it yet. Just ask me what you want to ask me.”

Kara laughed in surprise. “Really? I want to know so much. I want to know everything about you.”

Lena narrowed her eyes and turned her face, looking at Kara through the corner of her lashes. “How much did you read already?”  
Kara swallowed. “Um, the diary from the beginning to about the end of March, when your painting was done,” she said, gesturing to the canvases in the foyer, now tucked back into the nook under the stairs.  
Lena followed her gaze and walked over to look at them.  
“And the entry where you planned to come here to get away from Lex and Lillian,” Kara continued. “And then the one after the long gap in time, when you found the diary again. Plus a few of the letters, and one of the ones from Mina.” Lena’s head rose at the sound of the name she hadn’t heard spoken aloud in so long.

“So you read my confession?”  
“Yes.”

“I’m surprised you’re so calm around me, considering what you’ve been through, and what I did.”  
“Those were very different circumstances. It seems to me you probably saved a lot of people.”

“I didn’t save enough,” Lena said, thinking of the ones who’d died at Lex’s hands. Tilting her own portrait toward herself, and then the one of the young Luthor family, she gazed down at the painting of Lex in his prime. His was done at age 25, just like her own. Handsome, happy-go-lucky, and the world at his fingertips. She thought of the man he used to be.

Kara changed the subject. “The one of you, it captures you so well. It’s beautiful. Stunning.”  
Lena looked again at Kara across the room, a small smile on her face. “Thank you. I regret I didn’t get to enjoy it more, especially how much Lillian loathed that I’d worn breeches. Before everything went to shit.”  
“Will you tell me about it? The painting I mean. The pose, the artist.”  
Lena remained silent for a moment. “Not tonight. Everything is a little too close to the surface.”  
She rested the paintings back where they had been.

As she returned to the couch Kara watched how she moved, noted how penetrating her eyes were, holding her own, looking as if Lena could see inside her. Briefly she thought, this must be what it feels like to be prey. 

Streaky chose that moment to jump into her lap, startling her and breaking the spell.  
“Streaky,” Kara mock scolded. “Jerk. You scared me.”  
Lena sat beside them. Streaky left Kara’s lap to flop into Lena’s turning her belly up, inviting.  
“Huh. Well Streaky likes you,” Kara said.  
“We’ve gotten to know each other,” Lena said, giving the rubs she was asked for. “She’s sweet. A lot of animals don’t like me. I can’t go near horses anymore. I used to love the horses,” she said, sadness penetrating her voice. She took in a deep breath, or at least the gesture of one. “There I go, getting sentimental. See? Everything close to the surface.”

“It’s ok,” Kara said. “To feel things. It helps. It helped me.” Not even thinking about the intimacy of the move, she reached over into Lena’s lap to stroke Streaky’s fur. The purring amplified. “Streaky helped me feel things again. After.”

They sat together in a comfortable silence. Lena had been surprised that Kara would get so close, reaching over to pet the cat. Their heads were almost touching. She thought, perhaps, that Kara was just that sort of person, someone easy to touch. Mina had been like that. Reaching out for Lena constantly. Reaching out to hold her hand or wrap her arms around one of Lena’s biceps and pull her close. Reaching out to encircle her waist.

Lena wondered. She turned one of her hands palm-up on her knee. In moments Kara had taken it in both of hers, stroking the back and along her knuckles with a thumb.

Lena lifted her head and Kara did the same. Their eyes met.

“Kara, what’s going to happen if I let you stay here? How do I know you wouldn’t betray me?”  
“I would never do that,” Kara insisted in a sincere whisper. Lena believed her. “Besides,” she added, “Sam and Jess would know. I’d go to jail.”

Lena sat up, moving away from the intimacy that felt a little too easy.  
“So my lawyers are in on this whole revelation as well?” Lena asked.  
“Yes.”  
“And that I’m a vampire? Or hemovore, as you kindly put it?”  
“Yes. Well, they’re still sort of unsure about that part, but once they meet you I think they’ll be convinced.”

“Kara, I don’t think you understand that I haven’t even _considered_ exposing myself like this in decades. At least half a century. Making friends with mortals is dangerous. Greed, jealousy, envy, malice. It’s so easy to tip anyone a little too far and then poof, I’m gone,” Lena said. She searched Kara’s eyes.

“I’m not like that,” Kara said. “I wouldn’t ever do that to you.” Kara tilted her head in thought and continued, “What about Jess and Sam? They could write a contract, like an agreement for us. I could take care of the house and property for you. Maybe do things you can’t do for yourself during the day.” There was a long pause as she considered whether to say what she wanted to say next. “I could protect you during the day.”

Lena was touched, but uncertain. She masked it with amusement. “Could you now? What do you do?”  
“I’m an investigative journalist,” Kara answered confidently.  
“And you let Matthews dupe you?” Lena asked with a lifted brow.  
Kara sagged. “Please don’t rub it in. I checked everything I could check myself. I just couldn’t afford the attorney’s fees along with everything else.”  
“You work from home?”  
“Mostly.”

“I want the shutters back up,” Lena insisted.  
Kara filled with hope, Lena was thinking about letting her stay. Then her face fell. “But … it’s like a mausoleum in here with them up. I need sunlight to function. It’s like my battery charger.”  
“It is a mausoleum. Mine. You think you get to enjoy my whole house while I have to hide away like a rat in the cellar?”  
“You’re only awake … conscious … after sunset anyway. You can go wherever you want to then.”  
“I want to rest in my own fucking bed. I like it. The mattress is nice.”  
“What if I put the master bedroom shutters back up?” Kara bargained. “You could lock the door from the inside.”  
“What’s to keep you from taking the shutters back off during the day?”  
“Do you know how hard those were to take off?” Kara asked, astounded.  
“Do you know what happens if I get exposed to sunlight?” Lena countered.

“Lena, I don’t want to kill you!” Kara said in earnestness.  
Lena knew she meant what she said.  
“Look, I just find it very hard to trust people. I’ve had some close calls over the years, a lot of them just accidents. Do you want to know why the shutters were bolted on so securely?”  
“Why?”  
“Because one summer some kids broke in thinking this would be a great place to hang out and get high.”  
“What did you do?”  
“Luckily I was safe for the moment upstairs. I can do a few things with my mind. So I watched from the landing, watched them make themselves at home and light up in my parlor. Then I made them paranoid as fuck.” Kara laughed. Lena continued, “So paranoid they wouldn’t want to come back. And I hired a man to install the shutters. He worked for me off and on a lot. M’yrnn J’onzz.”

Kara gasped. “I think my contractor must be his son.”  
“Small world,” Lena said with a smirk. “Always has been.”

“So if I put the bedroom shutters back up?” Kara asked.  
“I suppose that will work for now,” Lena agreed. Kara leapt to her feet and did a little dance, startling Streaky, who bolted away. “But if I decide I need more, more go back up. Feeling unsafe every morning is a terrible way to exist.”

“Ok. I don’t want you to feel unsafe. I’ll ask J’onn to work on it today.” She wondered how she would pay for it, or explain it, but she would figure out something.  
“And call the lawyers. Have them come over tonight. I want a contract of our agreement. And I want to talk to them about what we’re going to do about Matthews.”

“God. I’m so humiliated,” Kara said, sinking back down.  
“Don’t feel bad, Kara,” Lena said. “If people didn’t fall for a pretty face and a good line I’d never get to eat.” She winked.  
Kara laughed and smiled her infectious warm smile, looking at Lena like she was the most fascinating woman in the world, like she really did want to know everything about her. Not just because she was curious, but because she cared. And with no fear at all. Lena basked in it.

“It’s very sweet of you to make me feel better about it, especially after I just moved into your house,” Kara said, warmth filling her voice.  
“I’m fairly certain, in all my years, no one has ever called me sweet,” Lena said, though she knew Mina had, many times, when it was just the two of them and no one could overhear.

Lena and Kara talked until almost dawn, Kara asking questions about Lena’s life, about the house and furniture, about what it was like to be queer in the 1920s and other decades. Lena was surprised by the ease of it. She’d kept herself away from mortals for so long, except when absolutely necessary. Kara was special. Time slipped by.

“I need to get settled for the day,” Lena said finally. “Livewire’s blood is hitting me like a hammer.”  
“Livewire, like the radio host Livewire?” Kara asked, eyes wide. Lena looked like she regretted saying anything. “I won’t tell anyone, I promise.”  
“Good,” was all Lena said. “Don’t let anyone in the basement today.”

“Got it,” Kara answered as she walked Lena to the cellar door. “I really enjoyed talking with you … getting to know you a little, Lena.”  
“Me too,” Lena said with a shy smile. She looked into those intense blue eyes again and was glad she had made the decision she had. “I’m glad you don’t want to kill me.”

“Goodnight,” Kara said as Lena descended the stairs.  
“Good morning,” Lena corrected, not looking back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Behind the scenes:
> 
> As I've mentioned in a couple comments, my characters went off-script, off-outline, and off-timeline about three chapters back. At one point I was going to have Kara (not yet knowing Lena's hemovore status) find Lena in the basement (having done her thing after feeding where she goes from bat to human form and wakes up on the ground) and think she was dead. After how the bat in the hair scene played out, I knew that really wouldn't work anymore.
> 
> And they weren't going to really talk for, like, another day or two after the one you've just read. But Lena was like, "She's right there, Bear. I'll just wake her up now." Who am I to say no to Lena Luthor?
> 
> Also I have completely worked out an explanation for Kara getting duped and how it was done. She did good research/investigation, but there's more to it than I've revealed.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you once more for all the kind comments. It really brings another dimension to the writing experience. I think there will be three or four (possibly five) more chapters, depending on length.

Kara had gone back to sleep in her own bed and was surprised when she didn’t wake until noon when J’onn started knocking loudly on the front door. She threw on sweats and a t-shirt and dashed down the steps, berating herself. This is how accidents happened, when you were supposed to be making sure no one went in the basement and you ended up sleeping until noon.

She checked that the cellar door was still securely closed, though she wasn’t sure why. No one else could get in the house. Alex didn’t even have a key yet.

Then she ran to the front door and opened it wide, plastering a smile on her face.

“J’onn, hi!”  
“Hi, Kara. I thought you might have gone out. I got the new cover for the breaker box, so I need to get into the cellar to install it.”  
“Today’s not a good day for that,” she said.  
“It’s just a couple of screws,” he assured her. “It will only take a minute.”  
“Nooo,” she stalled, trying to think of a reason not to let him into a space he’d basically had full access to for the last few days. “I … um, I … set off a bug bomb down there. It’s really toxic right now. The can said wait 24 hours.”  
J’onn looked confused. “I haven’t seen any evidence of insect problems,” he said, “other than a few spiders.”  
“There was … I saw a big giant, scary … ” she rambled.  
“Bug?” J’onn suggested.  
“Huge. I really need you not to go in the basement today,” she said in a deadly serious tone that left no room for argument. “I do have a new project, though. It’s important. I need the master bedroom shutters put back on.”  
J’onn’s poker face held and he showed no reaction, though she knew he must think it was a bizarre request.  
“I know it will be extra, but I need those back up, exactly the way they were,” Kara said, her face pleading.  
“All right, Kara. I can do that. I’ll need to get the shutters from my home, and I think new hinges are in order.”

He’d turned to step off the porch when Kara remembered something from last night.  
“J’onn was your father’s name M’yrnn?”  
He stopped in his tracks. “How did you know that?” he asked, turning back toward her, for the first time looking at Kara with suspicion in his eyes.  
Why did you even say anything, she chided herself.  
“Oh, I found some, um, old notes and stuff. I think he may have done work on this house a long time ago,” Kara ventured.  
“May I see?” asked J’onn.  
“I’m not sure where they are now. I was up late. Sort of a research frenzy.”  
“Yes, he did do some work here, but it was something he never talked about,” J’onn said.  
Kara nodded. If Lena liked him it probably meant he knew not to talk about her.  
“Until recently,” J’onn added.  
“Your father is still alive?”  
“Yes, very much so, though his mind isn’t what it once was. Symptoms of dementia have started to appear,” J’onn said. Kara considered this new information. This might be something she needed to be on top of. 

“J’onn, would you like to take a little break before you go get the shutters? I can help with them later. I’d love to hear more about your dad.”  
Minutes later they were seated with fresh coffee. Kara was good at getting people to open up, and J’onn was no different.  
“When I mentioned to him that I was working on this house, he started to tell me things he never has before, as if he had memories as clear as day of everything that happened when he was working here,” he said. “In fact, it seemed like it was seeing me unload the shutters from my truck that spurred them.”  
Kara nodded and didn’t say anything to interrupt J’onn’s flow of thought.  
“The thing is, I only recently remembered that that he worked on this house. I was just a boy at the time, and I was fascinated because I always imagined it was haunted. I wanted to know all about it. And though he had always enjoyed talking about his various jobs, this is the one place he refused to say anything about.”  
“That’s very interesting,” was all Kara said. J’onn stared at his coffee.  
“When he saw me with the shutters, he got upset. He said, ‘Those should not be here. Put them back.’”

J’onn looked at Kara, and for long moments they held each other’s gaze. His assessing her, and hers refusing to bend. With a slight nod, J’onn stood.  
“So I guess I’ll get on that then,” he said. “Just the master bedroom?”  
“For now,” Kara said. “But please don’t salvage the others yet. Just in case.”  
“All right,” he said. “I’ll be back shortly.” He let himself out and Kara sighed in relief.

After that she called Masters, Marsden, Pendlay and Huang and spoke with Jess. She and Sam would come over at 6:30, well after the sun had set. 

Kara put the diary and the letters back in the box as she had found them. She took them up to the master bedroom and put them on top of the bureau. She began to think of it as Lena’s bedroom.

Lena had mentioned she had wanted to enjoy her portrait more, so Kara took down the old tarnished mirror above the mantle in the parlor and hung Lena’s portrait in its place. She leaned the mirror against the hearth. The portrait was magnificent, its depiction of Lena showed her defiant and full of life. It was glorious, and almost as beautiful as the woman in person.

Kara couldn’t help but smile at the memory of their morning together. It had gone better than she’d dared hope for, especially considering their first meeting. Lena herself had been a surprise, and again not. She had been understanding about Kara reading some of the letters and the diary. Her willingness to listen and her generosity in allowing Kara to stay had been completely unexpected, as was her openness and a certain vulnerability. And then there was the funny and flirtatious side of her that Kara recognized from the diary entries. No wonder women wanted her. Kara could still feel the cool softness of her hand in her own.

She covered the other three paintings and returned them to the crate, setting the lid on top and pushing it back into the storage closet. 

She spent some of her afternoon coming up with a list of things she could do in exchange for Lena allowing her to stay in the house. She also pulled together all the documentation of what she had looked into when she investigated the real estate documents Mike had given her. The list of officials who had signed off on it, and the other properties sold in a similar manner that had gone unchallenged.

J’onn made short work of putting up the shutters, and she checked them for light tightness from inside Lena’s bedroom. It was good work.

By the time that was finished her lack of sleep had caught up to her again, and she dozed off on the couch once more. She awoke to pounding on the front door.

“Kara! Where are you? Let me in,” Alex yelled.  
Kara sat up so fast she got a head rush, and Streaky, who had settled on her chest, went flying. “Shit.” She looked at her phone. There were seven messages from Alex, and it was 5:30. The sun had set.  
She opened the door.

“About time,” Alex said, stepping around her even as Kara tried to subtly block her entrance. Alex didn’t even notice the effort as she easily slipped past. “Where have you been? You haven’t been answering texts and I haven’t heard from you since the bar.” Alex set two bags of takeout down on the kitchen counter.

“Alex, what are you doing here?” Kara asked.  
“Checking on you. You might be dead from dust inhalation for all I know since you haven’t bothered to communicate in a day and a half. I thought some food might bring you out of hiding.”  
She wasn’t wrong. Kara was starving. But Lena would also be … her thought was cut short by the cellar door opening.

_____

She was looking down at one of her more whimsical design sketches as she opened the door. She had woken up and decided to take a dig around her workbench through some boxes she hadn’t opened in years. 

“Kara, I found something I thought …” and as she raised her eyes she saw Kara, her eyes wide with … fear? Panic? And Alex, the sister, her eyes narrowed in suspicion, immediately taking a defensive fighting stance.

“Oh, hello,” Lena said. Why did nothing ever happen in the order she thought it would?

Kara’s mouth was opening and closing, but nothing came out. Finally she managed, “Alex, it’s ok,” placing a hand on her sister’s arm to get her to ease down from the attack mode she was coiled in.

Lena hoped Kara knew how to play along with a lie. “Hi, I’m Lee. I’m a grad student at NCU,” she supplied.

Alex did not look any less suspicious.

Lena continued. “Um, Kara was kind enough to let me take a look at some of the papers downstairs that belonged to the former owner,” she held up the design sketch. “I’m doing my thesis on Lena Luthor.”

Kara’s mouth hung open. Alex did not look any less suspicious, but she did relax her stance.

“That’s right,” Kara said. Alex glared at her with a look that said, I cannot believe you are letting strangers into your house. “Lee, this is Alex, my sister.”

“Lee, you wouldn’t mind showing me some ID would you?” Alex asked.  
“Alex!” Kara exclaimed. “Of course I already looked at her ID. How gullible do you think I am?” she improvised, but it was not smooth at all.

“It’s ok,” Lena offered, moving past Alex and out of the kitchen. “I don’t mind showing you. I just left my stuff,” she turned toward the parlor and had to force herself not to physically react when she saw the painting of her exact likeness hanging prominently over the fireplace. Shit. “It’s with my stuff in the library,” she said, and made a beeline for the room. At least her hair was pulled tightly back in the portrait.

She overheard the argument that ensued while she was retrieving her fake ID.

“Alex, don’t be rude.”  
“You didn’t even ask for an ID, did you,” Alex stated, not even a question.  
“I’m not stupid, Alex.”  
“That’s a no,” Alex said. Lena could almost hear the eyeroll. 

Lena emerged from the library carrying a notebook and pen that she had snatched from the desk and wearing a pair of thick framed glasses, the dusty lenses of which had been hastily wiped. Hopefully it made her look different enough from her portrait that the sister wouldn’t notice. She held out a card to Alex.

“Here,” she said, smiling.  
Alex took it and examined it carefully before handing it back.  
“Ok, Lee Mercer, tell me why you need to be poking around in my sister’s house?”  
“She doesn’t have to explain anything to you,” Kara said, stepping defensively in front of Lena. Alex raised her eyebrows and crossed her arms, ready to double down.  
Lena was impressed by Kara’s protectiveness, though. It was sweet. She stepped to one side.

“It’s no problem, Kara. I guess I need to get used to defending my thesis, right?” She laughed overly loud at her own joke, throwing in a snort for good measure. She cleared her throat and began the story she had initially rehearsed to tell Kara.

“Lena Luthor, who lived in this house for a good portion of her life, was an engineer and inventor, an unusual occupation for a woman of her time. It is believed that a good portion of her non-published papers are still here, and possibly some of her prototypes, so I asked if I could look around to verify that.”

“And?” said Alex.  
“And they are,” said Lena, meekly waving the design still in her hand.  
“So, as you can see, Alex, Len … Lee and I have some things to discuss. I promise to be more communicative, I just got wrapped up,” Kara said, trying to herd Alex to the door.  
“But I brought food,” Alex said.  
“Don’t let me be in your way,” Lena said. “If it’s all right, I could just look around in the library a bit?” she suggested, pointing back to the room adjacent to the parlor.  
“Sure,” said Kara. “Thank you for being so understanding.”

As soon as Lena left the room the argument resumed.  
“How do you know she’s not stealing valuable historic shit right out from under your nose?” Alex demanded. “You handed over practically every cent you had for this house and all the contents, and they’re yours. You don’t know what this kid might be slipping into her backpack. And what the fuck? Who dresses like that? She looks like Winona Ryder in ‘Beetlejuice.’”  
“Rude! She does not! Maybe she’s just a little eccentric. She’s not a kid, and she’s a grad student, not a thief. You’re just paranoid. Listen to yourself.”  
“Being paranoid is my job,” Alex said.  
“Well take the day off. Geez,” sighed Kara.

They continued to fight, but Kara also brought out plates and started unpacking the takeout. The sooner they ate the sooner she could get rid of Alex. It was edging toward six, and Sam and Jess would be there shortly. She hadn’t even had a chance to tell Lena the plan.

She shoveled food into her mouth as she thought, asking her sister about her day and not listening to the answer. Finally she told Alex she had remembered something she needed to tell Lee and excused herself.

She went into the library and closed the door. “I’m so sorry!” she started.  
“Don’t worry,” Lena said. “I think that went pretty well.”  
“How did you get a fake ID?” Kara marveled. “Is that some kind of mind trick thing?”  
“Long story. How are things going out there? Is she calming down?”  
“Not really. But Jess and Sam are going to be here in about 10 minutes, and I don’t know how to explain that,” Kara said.  
Lena thought for a moment.  
“They’re smart, right?” Lena asked.  
“Yes,” said Kara.  
“Well, let’s hope they’re as good as you are with following my cues. When they get here, just let me take the lead,” Lena said. “Trust me.”  
Kara smiled at her in a way that made Lena feel warm inside. That was unusual.  
“I do.”  
_____

When Kara and Lee emerged from the library, Alex’s eyes flitted from the young woman, to the portrait, to the mirror. Neither of them seemed to notice. But Alex noticed everything.

The three of them sat awkwardly around the dining room table. Alex offered Lena some of the food, but she politely declined. The young woman scribbled in the notebook as if she were lost in her own thoughts, but Alex sensed a hyper awareness about her. For example, she set her pen down mid-sentence but then jumped a few moments later when there was a knock at the door, pretending to be startled by it.  
_____

“That’s them. Do you mind?” Lena asked, jumping up and addressing Kara.  
“Go ahead,” Kara said.  
She opened the door, creating a small sight barrier between herself and Alex. Sam and Jess were still on the other side of the screen door, so she opened it and took a half step outside.  
“Hi, I’m Lee Mercer,” she said in an excited voice, and then much lower, “The sister is here, play along please.” Sam and Jess exchanged a look. Of course this was going to get even weirder.

Lena stepped back with Jess and Sam following her into the room. “Kara, Alex, this is Sam Arias and Jess Huang, who are the executors of Lena Luthor’s estate. They were really kind to go out of their way and stop by to discuss the legalities and ownership of the intellectual properties and papers with us.”

Jess and Sam stepped into the room, taking note of Alex’s glare. In Sam’s case she also took note of Alex’s style—tight dark jeans, boots, a form-fitting top that accentuated muscular arms, hair shaved on one side—and the fire in her eyes, which may have just swept down Sam’s body if she wasn’t mistaken. Sam put on a big smile, “Of course. We were happy to.”  
“Right. Lawyers never have anything better to do,” muttered Jess. “Or lives.”

“So,” Lena began, “as I emailed earlier, there is indeed a treasure trove of Lena Luthor’s papers and some mechanical pieces here. Ideally, I would catalog the collection as part of my thesis. I understand if the estate wants some sort of oversight. And of course, Ms. Danvers does not want any materials to leave the premises,” Lena said. “Where do we go from here?”

Sam took a deep breath. “I suggest we all sit down and discuss it.” She pulled a laptop from her bag and set it on the dining room table.  
Alex and Kara quickly cleared the table of plates and food, and Alex retreated to the parlor, pretending to browse her phone as she listened in.

Jess pulled a legal notepad from her own bag and a pen. Lena had the notebook she had brought from the library. Kara had her to-do list note pad.

While Sam started rambling about estate law and intellectual property rights, Jess wrote in large letters on her pad, “How long will this take?” and showed it to everyone at the table, keeping an eye on Alex.

Kara wrote next while Lena made up information about her department advisors and the condition of the documents she had already seen. “15 min tops -- Be boring!”  
Jess took a turn talking, and they all complied with the request, dredging up the most dull aspects of history, law, and academics that they could think of. 

Lena droned about the requirements of her research gathering and what sort of access she would need to documents, and what permissions from the executors of the estate to photograph the documents for use and future publication. 

Sam began a series of questions about potential uses that would have to be specifically approved—an impressively long list, and boring as fuck. In fact, no one at the table had ever written a thesis except Lena, but they made it sound plausible. 

In nine and a half minutes Alex was saying goodbye and telling Kara she would catch up later.

After the sound of Alex’s car engine died away, Kara heaved a sigh of relief.  
“Thank you. Alex is an FBI agent, and I really am not ready for her to be in the know on this.

Lena sat the glasses down on the dining room table. “So you’re my lawyers?” she asked.  
“Are you Lena Luthor,” Sam asked.  
“The very same,” Lena replied.

“If you need it, you have the entire firm at your disposal, Ms. Luthor. Can you prove that is who you truly are?” asked Sam.  
Lena turned her head to the portrait. “I have the provenance of the portrait. Do you want me to stand next to it?” she asked.  
“That won’t be necessary. Though we would appreciate a copy of the provenance,” Sam replied. Jess made a note on the top of a clean sheet of her legal pad. _Portrait provenance._

“And is it correct that you are, in fact, a …” Sam began.  
“Hemovore who doesn’t age? Yes,” said Lena.  
“A hemo- …” Sam repeated, but Lena interrupted.  
“Hemovore. Person who drinks blood,” Lena supplied.  
Jess and Sam exchanged one of their wordless communications.

“Now that we’re done with our game of pretend, let’s talk about what’s on the real agenda tonight, then,” Jess said.  
_____

Alex drove around the corner and parked in a strategic location that hid most of her car behind a hedge but left her with a line of sight to the front door. She pulled her phone from her bag.

“Vasquez, meet me around the corner from Kara’s place. I’m at Cypress and Gage. Bring the van.”


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, everybody. Sorry for the slower than usual update. I've finally got the opportunity to move out of a sort of toxic situation after a couple years of trying to make it happen, and I'm moving back to my old house (which I love). So packing and painting and calling utility companies and that sort of thing is happening.
> 
> Writing this story is sort of like therapy for me, though, so don't worry. I'm on it.
> 
> Thanks and a shout-out to one of my commenters in the end notes.

Alex Danvers glared at her sister’s front door with an intensity that could cut glass, which is probably the only reason she didn’t hear Vasquez approach the driver’s side door from behind her. 

There was a tap tap on the window behind her head.

“What the ever living fuck?!” she yelled. She rolled down the window.

“What? Did you want me to park the van right next to you and maybe put up a sign?” Vasquez asked as she bent down to pick up the cream colored Shih Tzu who’d been unphased by Alex’s outburst.

“What is he doing here?”

“I was getting ready to walk him when you called. Just because you have some harebrained plan doesn’t mean Strudel has to suffer.”

“That is the dumbest name for a dog ever,” Alex mumbled.

“Sure, Gertrude,” Vasquez deadpanned.

“Get in the car.”

Vasquez plopped in the passenger seat without much grace. “What’s the sitch, bi-”

“Don’t,” Alex said, batting away Strudel, who was trying to lick her ear.

“What’s got you in overprotective snoop mode this time? Kara buy a new pair of scissors and some running shoes?” Vasquez asked.

Alex showed her the live feed on her phone. Vasquez looked at the long shot of four people at Kara’s dining room table.

“Didn’t get invited to game night?” Vas ventured.

“Why did I even call you?”

“That’s my question, too,” Vas said.

“I go over to Kara’s with some food,” Alex began her narrative of the evening’s events, “and the person on the near left comes up from the cellar. A, Kara tried to keep me from coming inside, B, she didn’t tell me she had someone over, C, she was totally lying about who the person is.”

“Who is she?”

“She claims she’s an NCU grad student named Lee Mercer, even had ID.”

“But she’s not?”

“Lee Mercer is registered at NCU but has no other internet presence whatsoever, what do you think?”

Vasquez sighed. She knew Alex went overboard sometimes, but her intuition was usually spot-on. 

“Then Hottie and Sarcastro over there show up,” she said, pointing to Sam and Jess, “and goth girl over here runs to the door and is, like, ‘Play along ’cause Kara’s dumb sister is here,’ and they’re fine with that. They say they’re Lena Luthor’s estate lawyers coming to do a friendly free consultation, like lawyers do, because Mercer is doing her thesis on Luthor.”

“Hottie?”

Alex’s traitorous mind took a side trip to the vision of a slender figure in a just-barely-masculine-of-center suit and a flash of smile that promised she had other tastes Alex would love to uncover. “Deep brown eyes you could drown in,” Alex said. “Don’t distract me.”

“You don’t think they’re who they say they are, either?”

“They’re lawyers, all right, but I can tell by the body language that the conversation totally changed once I left.”

“And you planted the camera?”

“Yep.”

“And you need me?” Vas asked.

“To plant a couple more and get me sound,” Alex said. 

“Nope. That would be illegal.”

“What if I told you I’m 90 percent sure goth girl is Lena Luthor and that Kara’s ghost is a vampire?”

“I’m in.” Vasquez handed over Strudel and went to get equipment from the van.

As much as Alex hated to admit it, Vas was better at being stealthy than she was, and if this really was a vampire she did not want to get caught snooping and have to explain her suspicions. So far Kara still thought she was a not-so-mild-mannered FBI agent, and Alex wanted to keep it that way.  
_____

“I think that’s everything we need for now,” Jess said.

“Is your sister single?” Sam asked.

“Sam!” Jess snipped.

“What?” Kara asked, not sure she had heard correctly.

“Nothing,” Sam said. 

“Let us know if there’s anything else we can do for you, Ms. Luthor,” Jess said, smiling as she pressed Sam toward the door. Over the course of the last hour she had warmed up to the hemovore considerably. Lena’s intellect, wit, and ability to stay on task and not drag things out earned high regard in Jess’ eyes.

“Please, call me Lena. And just keep me posted on the Matthews issue.”

“We will. The information that Kara gave us should speed things up considerably,” Sam said.

The two said their goodbyes and Kara shut the door behind them just as she heard Jess say, “You _so_ have a type.”

“What? I know what I like,” Sam replied as they walked down the porch steps.

As their voices died away Kara and Lena looked at each other for a long moment, mouths twisted with the effort of containment until they couldn’t hold it any longer and collapsed into a fit of giggles.

“God what a day,” Kara exclaimed, sprawling on the sofa in a slump and sending a disgruntled Streaky bounding for the stairs and a quieter part of the house. “I’m so glad they’re all gone!”

“Me too,” Lena agreed, flopping down next to her. “I like Jess and Sam. The four of us work well together. I’m not accustomed to being around people, though. And I felt like Alex was glaring a hole in the back of my head.”

“She gets protective. And she thinks I’m naive,” Kara said. 

“Aren’t you?” Lena said, turning to Kara with a flirtatious teasing smile.

“No,” Kara said seriously, her eyes intense. Lena’s smile faded. This was a side of Kara she hadn’t seen. The two sat up and faced each other. Lena could hear Kara taking deep breaths as if she were preparing to take a tremendous dive into the unknown.

“You know what happened to me,” Kara continued, looking down. Lena reached out and took Kara’s hand before she was even aware she was doing it.

“Partially it’s a coping mechanism that I adapted when I was a kid,” Kara continued. She turned to Lena, holding her cool hand between her own. “Have you ever been surrounded by pity when you’re just trying to live? It’s like everyone is holding you under water. If you look like you’re happy all the time, they stop.” 

I never let anyone close enough to know I was hurting, Lena thought, but she could picture the stifling pressure that pushed Kara to find any way out.

“I discovered along the way that if you also seem just a little naive, people open up in a less guarded way, thinking you can’t see the truth. That’s part of how I ended up in investigative journalism.” Lena could tell by Kara’s sly smile that she was telling one of her secrets.  
_____

“I’m officially uncomfortable spying on your sister and her new girlfriend now,” Vasquez said over comms. “I’m taking Strudel home and going to bed. This is the least threatening vampire ever.”

“Girlfriend? You’re so off base,” Alex huffed. “You’re right about Lena though. She doesn’t seem to be much of a threat. There haven’t been any vamp-style killings or injuries pinging our radar either, so I think she’s the kind who lays low. I’m going to hang out a little longer just in case.” 

“Just saying. I called it.” Alex could hear Vas crank the van. “Get the cameras and mic back before you leave.” There was a pause before Vas added, “You’re going to get all cocky about that lawyer being interested, aren’t you?” 

“Good night, Vas,” Alex said, turning her eyes back to her phone. She was feeling pretty good about it, but she wouldn’t let Vas have the satisfaction of being right.

“How long are you going to play along with this grad student thing?” Vasquez asked.

“Until I can think of an appropriate way to make Kara suffer for thinking she could pull one over on me.” 

Now that Vasquez had said something about it, the position Kara and Lena were in, and the way Kara was opening up about herself, it was definitely more than friendly. Even though they hadn’t been getting much on audio since the women had lowered their voices, Alex turned off the feed from the mic.  
_____

“Perhaps you’re the woman of mystery here, Kara Danvers,” Lena said, her voice deep.

“There’s a lot that I don’t show to other people,” Kara said, her voice just above a whisper.

Lena was convinced that there was, especially as Kara began to run her fingertips along the inside of Lena’s wrist. There was an intensity building between them that Lena wasn’t sure how to respond to.

“Do you think Alex bought our story?” Lena asked softly, adding her other hand to the interchange as they sat facing each other, brushing the inside of Kara’s knee.

“I’m pretty sure she did. How did you come up with that ID?” Kara asked, looking up to Lena with wry curiosity.

Lena smiled back. “That was actually my initial plan to introduce myself to you … had a certain someone not scared the fuck out of me in the attic and boarded up my means of egress.”

“We’re moving beyond that,” Kara urged softly. “Keep going.”

Lena was fascinated by this version of Kara, the depth beneath the facade she’d described. She could feel the lure of Kara’s coaxing words. And with Kara touching her like this …

“I was going to introduce myself as Lee,” she said, barely able to string words together as the heat from Kara’s skin sank into her along the paths she stroked. “And tell you scintillating stories about the mysterious Lena Luthor,” she said, fluttering her fingertips in the air to illustrate. “Build up your curiosity.”

“Intriguing,” Kara said, pushing the sleeve of Lena’s sweater further up so that she could run the pad of her thumb across the soft pale skin of Lena’s forearm. “Is this ok?”

“Yes,” Lena said, swallowing. She could feel the electricity crackling between them. “Kara?”

“And then?” Kara said, undeterred from her task.

“I’d ask permission to examine the papers in the basement and show you a few things to impress you,” Lena answered, her voice just as soft and quiet as Kara’s now.

“You’ve already done that,” Kara said, her smile saying more. 

“You’re not repulsed by me?” Lena said, even though evidence to the contrary was right in front of her. 

“Not in the least,” Kara said without hesitation. 

Lena tilted her head. She’d always hidden who she really was for fear of how people would react, but Kara defied every preconceived notion she’d had. 

“And then …” Kara prompted.

“I would have asked if I could rent a room, because I work much better at night, and I could get more done that way without having to remove anything from the house.”

“An appealing proposition,” Kara said.

“You’d get to know me. I’d get to know you,” Lena said, and then, without thinking, “I didn’t think I would like you so much.”

“You like me?” Kara said, her blue eyes flashing. When Lena wouldn’t confirm or deny she added, “I’m not mistaken that you’ve been flirting with me, am I?” and moved her fingertips to Lena’s palm. Lena was mesmerized, watching the gentle motion of Kara’s caresses. There was a heat building inside her, overtaking the cold.

“I’m sorry,” Lena said automatically.

“Are you?” Kara asked, her eyes searching Lena’s face even though she already knew the answer.

“No.” 

Lena’s gaze was riveted to Kara’s mouth. She unconsciously ran her tongue across her own lips to moisten them.

And Kara was kissing her. Soft as first. Asking. Deepening as Lena responded.

Somewhere outside a car roared to life and tires barked as they briefly spun on asphalt before taking hold, but neither of them noticed.

It’s ok to feel things, Kara had told her. Now it seemed all Lena could do was feel.

The heat of Kara’s kiss swept away rational thought. Objections rose in her mind only to melt from the sensation of Kara’s tongue touching her own. Suggestions that they should talk about this were pushed away when Kara put a hand gently on her chest and urged her to lie back. Lena felt the weight of Kara’s body on of her own and it was bliss. 

She buried her hands in Kara’s dark blonde hair and held her, returning her kisses fiercely. Still, her mind protested. Kara doesn’t know what she’s doing. She doesn’t know the darkness inside you. You should stop. You should stop.

She gasped her willing surrender when Kara’s thigh slotted between her own. “Fuck.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Patoo for pointing out that Alex was probably Googling everybody from the couch. She totally was, but I didn't notice until you pointed it out.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ok, this chapter is mostly smut with deep feels mixed in. If that's the sort of thing you need to skip, go to the end and read the last two sections starting with "The next morning Kara was drifting awake".

Once she had made her decision it had been easy to open up to Lena. She didn’t feel fear, she felt exhilaration … and a connection. And when she let go of fear, something else flooded in.

Kara had never wanted to be with someone so much in her life. 

She had savored the look of surprise on Lena’s face and how her walls had fallen away. The way Lena responded to her touch just encouraged her. It made it easy to be bold. Even though she knew Lena was incredibly powerful in her own way, in this Kara wanted to take control.

With one hand gently pulling and pushing at Lena’s hip, pacing the movement of their bodies, and the other arm bracing some of her weight, Kara led them deeper and deeper into a new place.

She felt like she was flying and on fire at the same time. It was glorious.

And she wanted more. She pulled back from their kisses to gaze at Lena’s face, smiling as she Lena tried to chase her lips. Vibrant green eyes opened lazily and locked on her own. 

“Will you come upstairs with me?” Kara asked, beginning to rise. But Lena clutched at her shirt.

“Kara, are you sure?” Lena asked.

“Do you want me?” Kara said.

“Yes.”

“Then I’ve never been more certain.”

Kara took Lena’s hand and pulled her up from the couch. She left her at the foot of the stairs while she went to the kitchen to get a glass of water and turned off all of the lights. With moonlight pouring in, she took Lena’s hand again and led the way upstairs to the master bedroom.

“Were you planning this?” Lena asked.

“No,” Kara answered simply, looking back at her as they mounted the stairs. “But when I know what I want, I don’t like to wait.” They entered the dark bedroom and Kara went to the nightstand, setting down the water and turning on a lamp with a small Edison style bulb that cast the room in a warm amber glow. 

“I thought you might be ok with this. It’s not as harsh the ones downstairs.”

“I am. Thank you.” Lena closed the door behind them.

Kara pulled back the curtains to show Lena the shutters.

“J’onn put them back up today,” she said. “I checked when it was light out. You’ll be safe.”

Lena felt unexpected tears start to rise. Kara’s considerations … they were small things … but just to have someone think of her, of what she would like, of small comforts. Somehow it made her more aware of the crushing loneliness she’d lived with for so long. 

“Hey,” Kara said, noticing how Lena suddenly looked smaller, standing in the middle of the room in her black clothes, pale skin and smokey eyes. Kara went to her and wrapped her arms around her, pulling her into her chest and holding her tight. 

Lena broke inside the warmth of strong arms holding her. She didn’t know when she had cried last. She hadn’t been sure she was still capable of it. Like a wave with the entire power of the ocean behind it, sobs welled inside her and she couldn’t prevent them from crashing to the surface. They pounded her chest.

“What’s wrong? What can I do for you?” Kara pulled back enough to see Lena’s face.

“You care,” Lena said, incredulous, shaking her head. How did this even happen? The sobs stopped after just a few, and she was grateful for it. Now tears flowed silently down her cheeks.

“Yes,” Kara said. “And you care about me, at least a little. Or you would have just thrown me out.”

“I forgot what it felt like, to have someone care about me,” she said, swiping at the tears. Leslie cared in her own way, but she insisted on pretending she didn’t. 

“Lena, I wouldn’t have started this,” Kara said, motioning between them, “if I didn’t have feelings for you. That’s not me.”

“But why?” Lena asked, still confounded.

“Why?”

“Yes,” Lena said, waiting for an answer because she couldn’t understand it.

“I’m not sure I can explain it. Can’t it just be?”

“Please?” Lena asked.

Kara sighed. This felt a little odd, but Lena seemed to need it. “When I thought you were a ghost, I thought that must be lonely, but I had disturbed you, so I was sorry for that, and I cared about how you felt about me being in your house. Then we met, and I was afraid you were injured, and I cared about whether you would be all right.”

“Even though I told you to piss off?”

“You were hurt and scared,” Kara said. “I didn’t blame you. And then we talked and got to know each other a little, and I felt like you understood me better than almost anyone else. You’d been through something, too, and had to live with it every day. Not many people get what that’s like.”

“No,” Lena agreed.

“And then you let me stay. You put your trust in me … and that did it,” Kara admitted, touching her forehead to Lena’s.

“Aren’t you afraid of me?” Lena whispered.

“No. Are you afraid of me?” Kara asked.

“Right now I’m terrified, but not of you.”

“Do you want to stop?”

“No.”

“Will you let me care about you?”

“I can try.” Lena wanted this. She didn’t want to think about it too much. She wanted this and they could figure things out later. 

Kara kissed the top of Lena’s head, then her temple and cheek. She softly kissed her lips. Lena responded with an intensity that surprised them both.

Kara unwrapped the long scarf from around Lena’s shoulders and tossed it to the bottom of the bed. Lena tore off the black pullover after it, revealing a thin black tank underneath. She grabbed at the waist of Kara’s soft flannel shirt and tugged it loose from her jeans as Kara quickly undid the buttons and tossed it aside. She wasn’t wearing a bra.

Kara pulled back the heavy covers and sheet and crawled onto the bed, leading Lena by the hand with her. In moments she’d rolled them over so that she was on top. 

They paused just long enough to lock eyes and feel the sureness between them. 

When Kara kissed her again, Lena felt heat suffuse her. It was as if all that was needed for Kara’s warmth to overcome the cold was her permission to let it happen. 

Her desire came to life and she wanted to feel Kara everywhere, and Kara was just as eager. Lena felt her chemise being pushed up above her breasts and her pants unfastened and pushed down on her hips. Kara’s bare chest pressed against her own, and lips that felt burning hot trailed from her mouth to behind her ear as scorching fingertips found their way under the waistband of her panties, undoing her with soft caresses in the most tender spots. 

Kara’s mouth travelled to the hollow above her collarbone and Lena felt her laugh against her skin. 

“What?” Lena asked, smiling in response.

Kara pulled back to meet Lena’s eyes. “I have the strongest urge to bite you,” she admitted. 

The suggestion filled Lena with a craving for it. “Do it,” she said and watched Kara’s pupils widen to almost overtake the blue with black.

She felt the scrape of teeth at her throat and lips sucking flesh between them. The sharp edges of incisors pressed, trapping a thick rope of skin and muscle between them. Lena moaned.

A bold hand diving between her legs had her squirming, releasing Kara’s shoulders to hastily push her own pants and panties down and kick them off, freeing her legs.

“Kara! Fuck.”

“I want you,” Kara breathed, desperate with it. “I want you so much. Can I touch you? Can I fuck you?”

“Yes!” Lena pleaded, grabbing Kara’s wrist and grinding against the heel of her hand as fingers found their way deep into slick folds.

“You’re so wet,” Kara husked, her mouth moving to a nipple. Lena’s back arched off the bed.

Lena’s body felt like it was strapped to a rocket, hurtling up through the atmosphere, ignited by Kara’s touch. Her hands grasped at Kara’s shoulders and raked up her back. She was torn loose from every mooring and out of control.

Kara took Lena’s mouth again as her fingertips gently gauged what Lena’s body was asking for. She slid inside and gasped at how good it felt when Lena twisted beneath her and her thigh pushed hard between her own. She regretted not taking her own pants off yet, but she hadn’t wanted to slow down for it.

Lena rocked on the bed in rhythm with Kara’s hand, occasionally opening her eyes to catch Kara watching her in rapt attention. 

Kara slowed the pace and withdrew almost all the way before pushing back in, repeating this and paying special attention to the spot inside the woman beneath her responded to most. She knew Lena wanted more, that she was teasing her relentlessly, and it was hard to hold back. But she wanted to take Lena as high as she could. She was waiting. Waiting.

Tension built as Lena tried to make Kara go faster. Her body quaked with want. Finally … 

“Kara, please!” Lena begged. “Please!”

Kara gave her what she needed, and watched as the beautiful woman shattered in pleasure, erupting as she came around Kara’s hand, her hips thrusting in search of more. Kara didn’t stop until she felt Lena collapse into boneless release. 

She gently eased her fingers from Lena’s body and moved to lay beside her, taking a moment to push her pants and soaked panties off and toss them to the floor. She rolled to her side and wrapped an arm across Lena’s stomach, resting her cheek on her shoulder.

Lena thought she might have dozed off—which was something she didn’t really do—before she came to consciousness again. She turned her head only to find Kara gazing at her with a look on her face that said she was not done.

Lena came gloriously under Kara’s hands again and again. And every time she tried to move to give Kara the same release, Kara would tease her and distract her with nips and kisses and explorations of Lena’s body. And promises that Kara would give her what she sought, and soon, but not tonight.

The hours of darkness slipped away and they both fell asleep.  
_____

The next morning Kara was drifting awake next to Lena, feeling it was late in the morning but not quite ready to open her eyes and get up yet. It was a little disconcerting to hold Lena next to her but feel no rise and fall of breathing. 

Kara thought back to their time together and realized that Lena must imitate breathing consciously while she was with mortals, to blend in and seem more alive. Or perhaps when she was conscious it came naturally to sigh, to gasp, to deeply inhale. The manner of breathing was a tremendous part of human expression. It was during this pondering that she heard a faint creak of the front door opening and fear locked in her chest. 

She slipped out of bed, turning on the bedside light and quickly finding her clothes. She pulled on pants and a shirt and slipped out of the room. She quickly darted into her own room to retrieve a baseball bat she always kept next to her own bed. She didn’t like firearms, but as a single woman she felt it was good to have something handy in reach. Just in case. 

She crept to the top of the stairs and saw a shadow moving in the parlor. The front door was standing open. She descended two steps, keeping away from the creaky spots, and when she bent down she saw Alex slipping something from the table by the couch into her pocket.

“Alex!” she said loudly, and her sister froze only for a microsecond before turning smoothly as if nothing were out of the ordinary about her breaking into Kara’s home.

“There you are,” Alex said, picking up Kara’s phone from the coffee table and waving it around. “Do you know how many texts I’ve sent you this morning?”

“I don’t care. You can’t break in here! And what did you just put in your pocket?” Kara demanded.

“I was worried! When I left there were three complete strangers in your house. I never heard anything from you for the rest of the night and you weren’t responding this morning. What do you think I was thinking? You’ve got to quit worrying me like this.”

Kara could tell Alex was diverting, she was definitely hiding something. 

“You need to stop treating me like a child. I can handle my own life. Now tell me what you put in your pocket, Alex, because I really hope it’s not what I think it is.”

“You’re too trusting. Women get murdered and go missing every day. I know because I see it. You think everyone is good at heart and it’s just not true. You have to be more cautious.”

Kara was fuming as she descended the rest of the stairs, bat in hand. If she had to wrestle Alex to the ground and search her pockets she would do it.  
_____

Lena woke to the feeling that something was wrong and immediately picked up on agitated energy from Kara. It was a new sensation to her, feeling this kind of connection to someone. But she couldn’t take time to examine that now. There was a threat outside this room. It was daylight. She had to go protect Kara, though. Daylight be damned. 

She went to the armoire and pulled a thick quilt out. She hastily pulled on pants, socks and her top with sleeves then threw the quilt over her head, making a deep hood to peer out of and keeping her hands covered.

She opened the door and rushed out, squinting against the sun coming through the uncovered windows. From the top of the stairs she saw Kara below, holding a bat.

There was so much sun down there. She tried moving around and waving as best as she could to catch Kara’s attention without alerting the intruder, but to no avail.

What worried her most was the front door standing open. She had to let Kara know she was there to protect her. She moved halfway down the staircase.

“Kara what’s wrong? Do you need help?” she whispered.

“No,” Kara said in a strong voice. “Go back to the bedroom.”

Alex sauntered into view.

“She moves fast. What the hell are you thinking Kara?” Alex accused.

“No, I move fast, and it’s none of your damn business, Alex. Now what …” 

“God, you always rush into things without thinking. You have zero impulse control,” Alex practically shouted, waving at Lena. “You barely know this person. You just met her!”

“Alex, stay out of my business,” Kara fumed. “You don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“Fine!” Alex said, snatching her bag off the couch and storming through the door, slamming it behind her.

It wasn’t until Kara heard the car engine roar to a start that she realized Alex had distracted her from the real issue. The only real reason Kara could think of that Alex would physically pick the lock and break in was to retrieve something she had left here the night before. 

“Shit!”


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Matthews Issue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for the wonderful comments. I love hearing about what you think and what really engaged you as a reader. Things are going to start to move quickly after this chapter.

“Kara?” Lena asked from under the blanket. There were many questions behind the simple statement of her name. Are you okay? What was that about? What just happened? Lena felt the anxiousness of rushing into an unknown situation abate, and with it much of the strength she had pulled from her depths to be able to come to full consciousness in daylight and face the sun. 

“I’m not sure, but I think my sister might have left surveillance equipment here last night, and I’m going to murder her for it,” Kara said in a way that made Lena unsure if she was serious or not. “Come on, let’s get you back into the dark.” She led Lena back up the staircase. 

Kara wrapped an arm around Lena and they climbed the stairs together. “Were you going to tackle Alex in the sun to protect me?” Kara asked.

“I didn’t know it was Alex, but yes. If someone was threatening you, I would.”

“How did you know?”

“Something woke me up. I could feel that you were upset, like the feeling was in my own chest.”

“I guess that’s good, but I don’t want you to take risks like that for me,” Kara said softly. Somewhere along the way she had developed a very protective sense for Lena, like a natural extenuation of how she had felt about the house before she knew about its nocturnal occupant.

“What about you? You were going to go one-on-one with a home invader?” Lena asked with a slight note of scolding in her voice.

“I know I may not look like it, but I’m actually a very skilled fighter.” Lena tilted her head in surprise. “Alex trained me, and she didn’t take it easy on me either. When I was having some confidence issues it really helped.”

Kara closed the bedroom door and took the quilt away from Lena and laid it on the bed. The pale woman looked like she was losing energy by the second.

“Are you ok?” Kara asked.

“Yeah. I’m just a little tired now. It’s like coming down off an adrenaline surge.”

Kara helped her take off the clothes she’d put on, and Lena grinned. “I wish I was up for more but I think I’m going to be unconscious in about a minute,” she said.

“I think you’ve had enough for one day,” Kara grinned.

“Just remember, next time it’s your turn,” Lena reminded her as she sprawled out under the sheets and closed her eyes.

“I’m looking forward to it,” Kara said with a wink. Lena chuckled. “I’m going back out to call Alex and leave a note for J’onn, then I’ll come back to sleep a little more with you.”

There was no response. Lena was out. Kara kissed her head and went back downstairs. 

When she retrieved her phone she saw there were no messages or voicemails from Alex. She’d been bluffing. Kara wanted to call and yell at her right then, but she knew it would be a waste. This was more than Alex being worried about her hooking up with a grad student, and she needed to figure out what that was first.  
_____

“Shit, Vas, I fucked up.”

“You don’t say.”

“Kara caught me slipping the camera into my pocket and was grilling me about it, so I yelled some shit at her that I knew would punch her buttons to distract her, but it got pretty intense. Oh, and she’s sleeping with Luthor apparently.”

“Called it. And I told you to get the gear before you left.”

“Shut up. I had to get the one inside.”

“And you made enough noise to wake them up?”

“It’s an old house! It creaks everywhere! What am I going to do? She already suspects it was surveillance stuff, and she’s so mad at me right now.”

“Try grovelling and admitting what you did was wrong,” Vas said. “I’ll owe her an apology, too, but I’ll wait until you do yours first.” Alex nodded, looking deep in thought. Vasquez gave her the update on what she had done that morning. “I added Lena to our database and filled out the info we know. You’re welcome. I double-checked for blood loss incident reports and got nothing, and as far as I can tell she’s not even hitting blood banks.”

“Which means she’s a feeder,” Alex said. 

“But not locally,” Vas added.

“So maybe we’ve got a bargaining chip.”  
_____

Kara: I’m too mad to talk to you right now, but we ARE going to have a talk. Not tonight. Sam is bringing over paperwork for Lee and I don’t want you around scowling and glaring.

Kara finished typing and hit send. That’ll get her, she thought.  
_____

Later that evening Sam and Jess came by to brief Lena and Kara on what they had discovered. 

“Kara was right,” Sam said. “He makes an appearance at new home buyer seminars once or twice a year with an offer of a special-deal fixer upper to the right prospect.”

“What surprised us is how many officials he’s gotten to let this slip through the cracks. As far as we can tell, he’s not even bribing them. It’s like he smiles and winks and they just commit fraud like it’s nothing,” Jess said.

“What’s stranger,” continued Sam, “Is that we deal with a few of these people all the time and they’re above board, honest people.

Kara drummed her fingertips on the table as she listened. She felt like there was a puzzle piece about to click into place, and it was related to how Mike was somehow able to get her to fall for something even when the things he said to her would normally raise big red flags. In retrospect, she could pinpoint several conversations where she should have walked away from the offer and couldn’t understand why she hadn’t. 

They just had to figure out how he was doing it.

On the notepad in front of her, Lena wrote, “Someone is lurking outside,” and showed it to Kara. 

Kara scribbled underneath it, “It’s Alex. I’ve been expecting her.” As soon as Lena had read it she showed it to Jess and Sam as well.  
_____

From the shift in conversation Alex knew she’d been made, but she had also gotten some very valuable intel. If her suspicion was correct, everything made more sense now. She dashed across the lawn to her car down the street. She was three steps ahead of everyone in that house now, and she might be able to help.  
_____

Kara wasn’t surprised when there was a knock a few minutes later. She rose and opened the door to a shame-faced looking Alex, her fists clenched and arms held tight to her sides, making her look smaller than her usual confident stance. Kara wasn’t falling for it.

“I told you I had plans tonight,” she said. 

“I know, and I’m sorry for barging in, I just didn’t want to go another day without apologizing to you and Lee,” Alex said.

Lena’s head snapped up from her notes. She hadn’t expected to be included in any apologies. From the look on Kara’s face, she hadn’t either.

Alex swept a look over to Jess and Sam, with a flash of a smile at Sam in particular, then back to Kara.

“Is there somewhere we can talk a little more privately?” she asked. 

Kara nodded toward the library and she and Alex headed that way. When Alex saw that Lena wasn’t coming with them she stopped. “Lee, if you don’t mind, I really would like to include you, too.”

Lena hesitantly stood and followed them into the library, where Kara sat on the desk and crossed her arms. Lena stayed by the door, and Alex leaned back against a bookcase between them.

“Look,” she began and then deliberately softened her tone, “I know I was an ass for showing up this morning to check on you,” Alex said.

“And picking my lock,” Kara supplied.

“And picking your lock,” Alex confirmed.

“And taking _what_ when you left here?” Kara asked.

“And I know I overstepped boundaries in a big way,” Alex said with an outpouring of emotion that she hoped was distracting. She kept going, not leaving room for Kara to say anything. “I was worried and suspicious. You’re absolutely right. And you’re an adult, and I should trust your judgment, Kara,” she said, taking her sister’s shoulders in hand.

Alex turned to Lena next, putting her hands on Lena’s shoulders in a similar way to show her sincerity. “And I apologize to you, too, Lee. I had no idea I would be interrupting a private moment, and I’m so sorry I prejudged you based on no evidence other than my poor opinion of most people in general.” 

She stepped back and addressed them both. “I don’t get called in to see the nice things that people do for each other. Just the bad stuff. And sometimes I forget that not everyone has malicious intent.” She looked at Kara again, this time with teary eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

Kara was still mad, but it was a pretty good apology from Alex. She opened her arms in invitation and Alex stepped in for the hug, wrapping her arms around her back. 

Lena looked on with doubt. Alex was still up to something, she was sure. Unexpectedly, Alex turned to her again, this time taking Lena’s elbows in hand. 

“Is it ok if I hug you, too?” Alex asked.

“Um,” Lena replied uncomfortably, looking to Kara for guidance. Kara’s suspect expression wasn’t a lot of help. But then just as quickly, Alex stepped back.

“It’s ok. Not everybody is a hugger,” she said. “Ok, let’s go back out there. I’ve taken you away from your project long enough.” And with that she opened the library door and sauntered through the parlor and back to the dining room.

Lena and Kara followed, exchanging looks and neither exactly sure what had just happened.

“Ms. Huang,” Alex said, and then turning a much more loaded gaze to Sam, “Ms. Arias, it was very nice seeing you again. I’m sorry to have interrupted. I’d love to hear more about this project,” she continued, still addressing Sam, “when all the details are ironed out and such. It sounds fascinating.”

“Absolutely,” Sam said with a grin, knowing that Alex had zero interest in this project.

She took her leave after saying goodbye to Kara.

Kara waited until Alex was well away from the house before she turned to the others and said, “Alex knows more than she’s letting on. Probably a lot more.”

_______ 

“Is she a threat?” Lena asked.

Kara considered the question carefully, thinking of what Alex might have heard, of their relationship, and about how odd she had just been acting.

“No, I don’t think so. There’s a lot of things about Alex I’m rethinking right now, and she may be playing some long game with me, going along with the Tess Mercer story, but if she thought Lena was a threat or that I was in danger she would have acted already and we probably wouldn’t see it coming.” Kara folded her arms across her stomach and continued to stare at the door. “I’m starting to think that Alex not believing in anything supernatural has been an act all along.”

“In that case I think that our focus should stay on Matthews,” Lena said. “And I think we’re all starting to think along the same lines.”

“There’s something more to Matthews than just some slick lines and gullible targets,” Jess said.

“Exactly,” Sam agreed. “From what I can find about the women we know he sold to, most them are smart, savvy people. It’s just the special circumstances of this house that exposed the con.”

“I have a feeling he’s not at all what he appears to be,” Lena concluded. “I’ll go scope out his house tonight and see what I can learn.”

“Are you sure that’s safe?” Jess asked. “We could have our investigator dig deeper.”

“I have a feeling that it’s not something your investigator would be able to detect,” Lena said. “Or worse, what if he fell under the spell of it? It could be a mind control thing.”

Kara sat next to Lena and took her hand. “But what about you?”

Lena grinned with the confidence of someone who had the skill to elude every security camera and get past every lock she had ever come across. “He’ll never know I was there.”  
_____ 

Jess and Sam went home, and Kara and Lena stayed up talking for a while. 

Lena was still tired after her daytime efforts, and she knew her corporeal self would begin its waning phase into her more ethereal form in a few days. She wondered how Kara would feel about that, but she wasn’t sure how to bring it up yet. 

She had fine tuned the balance of her nutritional intake over the years into a well regulated lunar cycle with minimum need to feed from humans. It kept her going in a way that didn’t make her blood mad like Lex had been, drunk on too much power, but not starved and driven to desperation with wanting either. 

Having to feed from Leslie had thrown off that balance already. Losing some vital energy during the day was going to make the rest of the lunar phase difficult, but she could deal. As long as Alex didn’t cause any more mid-day disruptions. 

“I think it’s time,” Lena said when a bank of clouds had settled in, blocking the moonlight.

“Ok,” Kara said, yawning.

“I think you need to catch up on some sleep, darling,” Lena said. 

Kara smiled at her bashfully. “Darling. It’s a little old fashioned, but I like it.” She leaned in to kiss her.

Lena returned the kiss with pleasure before pulling away. “I’m an old fashioned kind of girl.” 

She stood but didn’t let go of Kara’s hand yet.

“Promise you’ll be careful,” Kara asked and stood to walk with Lena to the back door. Streaky appeared from nowhere and sat at Kara’s feet as if waiting for the show.

“Always,” Lena promised with a peck to Kara’s cheek. She bent down to stroke the cat as well.

“Can I watch this time,” Kara asked, a hopeful smile on her face.

“I suppose,” Lena said, standing up again. “You can tell me about it when I get back. It’s been many years since I saw Lex do it,” she said, distantly recalling the terrified state of shock she had been in at the time. It was a wonder she had managed to retain as much information as she had, considering.

“I’ll try to wait up, but I might fall asleep,” Kara said.

“I’ll have my key. I’ll wake you when I return.”

“Be safe,” Kara said, opening the door. Lena nodded. After one more kiss she stepped out onto the small back porch, turned toward the open night and transformed.

Streaky swatted at the air, while Kara had difficulty processing what she had seen. It was almost as if there was Lena and then a vapor that rose from where she’d been, and then a bat hovering in place for a few beats of her wings before pushing through the air into the sky.

Kara smiled as she watched the flitting dark shape grow smaller with distance and shook her head. She was falling for a woman who could fly, and she couldn’t think of a single thing wrong with that.  
_____

Flight was a special joy, and the rush of it revived Lena. Having the location where she wanted to go in mind when she changed was all she needed to get to her destination. She flew to the deepest shadows under the trees of the suburban lawn and transformed into the state she thought of as her stealth mode.

It was an in between place where she was light as air and a part of the night, but she still had the ability to pull back into her human body if need be. She looked at the back of the Matthews home. Two shapes moved around on the first floor, shadows cast on curtains, one taller than the other. Lights went out, and a single one turned on in a second floor window. She waited. 

Once all the windows were dark she continued to wait until she felt the house was peaceful and the souls inside asleep. 

She couldn’t sense anything unusual or magical from where she stood, so she decided to scale the house and take a peek into the windows. Perhaps she would pick up on an energy that would give her a clue from the structure itself. 

Like a breeze she crossed the lawn. All she had to do was press her fingertips to the side of the house and pull herself up, like climbing a ladder without gravity to weigh her down. She swiftly reached a second floor window and looked inside.

Just before her body filled with lead and plummeted to the ground, she recognized the man looking back at her from the other side of the glass. Mike Matthews.

Her back hit the earth with all the impact of her dead body. She didn’t feel pain. She didn’t feel anything. She couldn’t move. She remembered a similar feeling once when she was a girl and she’d fallen off her horse, the wind knocked out of her. But at least in that moment her heart was still beating. In this one she had never felt more cold, more dead.

As she stared at the sky and the treetops and the peak of the roof above her, she heard a voice from inside. 

“I don’t know, honey. Maybe a branch fell. I’ll go look.”

No. No no no no no no. She frantically tried to find her way to another form, but her mind felt thick and heavy. She heard the back door open. The clomp of footsteps on brick and then a gentle shush of grass.

The man’s face leaned over her with a remote look of mild curiosity, as if he were examining a dead bug on the sidewalk. He smiled that greasy smile, but it quickly faded to nothing. 

“Did you think I wouldn’t know it was you when you played that disgusting trick on me at your house?” He waited for an answer, as if he expected one, but she could tell he knew she was incapable of speaking.

“I was so sure you had moved on to some other hidey hole. I mean who lives in a house with no electricity and boarded up windows for twenty fucking years?” he demanded angrily then calmed again, his moods shifting rapidly. “Anyway, I got mother to put wards on me and the house. You have no power here.” He smiled congenially as he lifted a vial of clear liquid held between his thumb and forefinger and showed it to her.

She didn’t know what it was. Holy water? Did that work if you didn’t believe? She had never tested it. Her arms flinched uselessly as she tried to just fucking get up, run, whatever she could do to break this paralytic state. 

Most bitter was the thought that she was going to be taken out by this rube who didn’t have any power of his own. It was his mother … and she was sure that whatever was in that vial, it was created by the same woman who had stripped away all of Lena’s powers away in an instant.

She could only watch as Matthews pulled out the stopper.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might normally try to spend more time on a chapter, but I didn't want to leave you all stranded with that cliffhanger on Halloween. 
> 
> Thank you for all the great comments! See the end notes for a little more info.
> 
> Sidebar: Two recommendations for wonderfully written under-kudo-ed works in progress (and almost finished) "Double-bar Daxam" by Alsike and "Title Goes Here" by elizabethdell.

Matthews held the vial at arm’s length, his mouth twisted in disgust as if he didn’t want to be near it. He tipped the glass and the liquid flowed easily to the lip.

Time slowed. Washes of memories swept through Lena’s mind, faces and moments from her long life … drunken parties, the war years, labs and work rooms, lovers … Mina. Times she had wished for an end.

And then there was Kara, so vivid in every detail, the way she smiled, the way she smelled, the joy and hope covering sorrow, the power of her voice when she thought no one could hear her singing, the way she touched Lena in a way that made her feel alive. Lena’s long-cold heart jumped in her chest, and something deep inside surged up. She felt the change come over her. She became the bat, taking wing and fleeing into the sky.

There was a hiss when the liquid hit earth, and Lena heard a hushed curse from below.

“It was just a branch, honey,” the man called into the house.

Human words didn’t matter. She felt depleted in a way she had never experienced, but she knew her destination and she flew with purpose. She would get home.  
_____

A shuffling noise on the back porch woke Streaky. 

Sneaky Person had returned. She trotted into the food room and waited for the way outside to open. She liked Sneaky Person because she prowled at night and smelled like something wild. Like things from outside.

She heard shuffling again. Streaky leapt onto the high floor and put her front paws on the see spot.

A small dark shape below struggled, crawling. Exciting. Sneaky Person was in her Attic Bird shape. Streaky opened her mouth to see if she could taste her smell, but couldn’t. She meowed loudly. Attic Bird didn’t respond. She was too limp, distressed. Something would catch and eat her.

Streaky needed to get her. She watched, agitated, as Attic Bird heaved up on the crook of her wings and fell off the porch.

Streaky leapt off the counter and ran to her Warm Person sleeping in the other room. She jumped onto her chest.

_MmmRRROWWRR._

There was a small sign of wakefulness but not enough.

Streaky insisted. _MmmRRROWWRR._  
_____

That hurt, Lena thought. Her limbs felt so weak, and her nose was pressed into the dirt. Her head pounded. She couldn’t fly anymore, but she was home. Still, this wasn’t safe. She was exposed. She crawled toward the darker shadows and collapsed.

There was a slap of wood on wood above her, and footsteps. She held as still as she could. Then another slap, but quieter.

“Streaky! Come back here!”

Suddenly she felt teeth set gently around the back of her neck and tug at the loose skin there. She was being picked up. She recognized this presence. She didn’t struggle. Her wings scraped the ground and tangled with furry legs, and then they were bumping along wooden steps as the cat took them in bounding leaps.

“Streaky, what? Oh, god! Lena?!”  
_____

Kara’s heart was in her throat as she padded behind streaky, desperate not to scare her cat lest she clamp down, but needing to get Lena away from her as quickly as possible. She wasn’t sure if Streaky was carrying Lena like a kitten or like something she planned to eat, and she didn’t want to find out if it was the latter.

She had just been getting over the surprise of learning that Streaky could open the screen door by herself when the little jerk jumped off the porch and disappeared under it. When she had come back carrying something, Kara was afraid it was a rat. But then she saw the wings and realized it had to be Lena.

She stepped lightly along the floor in her sock feet. “Good Streaky. Good girl. Thank you for finding Lena.”

Streaky finally stopped in the middle of the parlor rug and set Lena down. Before Kara could get to them, Streaky laid down beside the bat, putting a possessive paw over her, and began to lick the back of her head.

“Streaky, let me take care of her,” Kara said softly as she crouched down. Streaky didn’t protest as Kara gently pulled Lena away from her and stood, holding the bat to her chest, supporting her head. She looked over her carefully and didn’t see any wounds, but she also wasn’t moving. Did Lena breathe in her bat form? Was this normal? She needed help.

As smoothly as she could, she hurried upstairs and pulled a thick towel from the bathroom closet to wrap around Lena. She gently laid Lena in the towel, carefully folding the wings around her body like she had seen them in the attic, and swaddled the towel around her, leaving plenty for her head to nestle on. With Lena cradled in her arms, Kara went back downstairs to her phone and flipped to recents.

“Pick up, pick up, pick up … Alex!”

“What’s wrong?”

“Alex, it’s Lena. Something’s really wrong.”

“Are you in danger?”

“No, it’s … she’s hurt.”

“I’ll be right there, but stay on the phone with me,” Alex instructed as she slid in an ear piece. Neither of them bothered with the pretense of Lee Mercer.  
_____

Alex’s mind shot in a thousand different directions, imagining scenario after scenario. She had a basic med kit in her car, but with a vamp she would need supplies from HQ. She opened her garage door, threw herself into the driver’s seat, and pulled away at speed.

She could hear Kara over the phone trying to calm her breathing. 

“Ok, Kara, cards on the table. I know she’s Lena Luthor, I know what she is. Tell me what happened. Be as specific as you can.”  
_____

After they talked Alex said it would be 20 minutes until she got there, and it was the longest wait of Kara’s life. She paced with Lena in her arms as Streaky watched. She kept talking to her, thinking maybe she could understand, and at least know that they were trying to help her.

“It’s going to be okay, Lena. Everything’s going to be okay. Did I ever tell you that Alex is also a doctor? I mean, she never had a practice, but she has all the training. She’s good. I’m pretty sure she’ll know what to do.”

She would rub behind the big black ears and stroke the fur underneath her sharp chin.

“What happened to you? Can you wake up? Will you please wake up for me, Lena?”

She had lifted one of Lena’s tiny eyelids a few times, but each time it would drift slowly closed again.

She examined her carefully once more to check for wounds or even punctures. She ran her fingers carefully over the fur to see the black skin beneath. She turned the heat up in the house.

Finally Alex pounded on her door and Kara rushed to open it. Alex strode inside carrying a large plastic case.

“Where is she?” Alex asked.

“Here,” Kara said, looking down at the bundle in her arms.

Alex stepped closer to see. “Shit. She can really shift.”

“What does that mean?” Kara asked as Alex motioned her to the dining room and set down the case, cracking it open. “I told you she was in her bat form.”

“I know, it was just hard to believe. I’ve never seen it myself. Not many vamps can do that. It’s really complex to transform into something with a lot less mass. Lay her down here,” Alex instructed.

Kara put Lena down on the table and crossed her arms over her stomach. The worry was tying her up inside. What if getting Lena involved with the Mike Matthews problem had gotten her killed? She’d never forgive herself. Lena had been so protective of her, but she hadn’t thought Lena needed protection from anything other than sunlight and nosy people.

Alex glanced back at Kara and did a double-take. “What happened to your nose? Did she scratch you?”

“No, that was Streaky. If she hadn’t woken me up and started acting really weird at the back door …”

“Don’t think about it too much.” Alex looked down at Streaky, who was watching the proceedings politely from the floor, though she was considering a closer seat. “That’s my brilliant furry niece. Doing some familiar action on the side, baby?”

“What are you talking about?” Kara asked, getting impatient with Alex’s nonsense and her slow, meticulous examination of Lena. “I told you I already checked her. There aren’t any wounds.”

“It’s always good to have a second pair of eyes.” Alex stood and faced her sister. “The good news is, she looks stable. Her eyes and skin look good. She’s alive in her own way. Vampires are hard to kill.”

Kara breathed out a sigh of relief, but knowing Lena would be okay was only one part of the equation tonight.

“How do you know that?”

“It’s my job. Or part of my job. Look, I’ll answer all … well, some … of your questions after, but for now run down what happened tonight again. I might have missed something while I was driving. Start with the part after I left, when Arias and Huang were still here.”

“We’ve been trying to get to the bottom of how Mike sold me Lena’s house without her ever giving up ownership. It goes deep, but it’s also weird. He’s somehow getting people to forge things and commit fraud who normally wouldn’t. Lena decided to fly to Mike’s house to check it out. She thought maybe she would be able to sense something. She made it back here somehow, but she was like this when Streaky found her,” Kara said, looking down with so much concern at the too-still body covered in fur.

“Damnit, what are we up against?” Alex exclaimed. “I thought those wards I put on you tonight would be enough to protect you.”

“What wards? Damnit, Alex. How much have you been lying to me about?”

“Pick her up. I know you want to,” Alex said, moving to the parlor sofa. “Let’s talk.”

Kara wrapped Lena back in the towel and cradled her to her chest as she followed and sat next to her sister.

“Look, I know you know I was trying to figure out who Lena was since she came into your life from nowhere,” Alex began. “That wasn’t even hard. Lena is excellent at being off the radar, but once I had the Luthor name to go on, and her standing right under her own goddamned portrait, it was easy to track things back and see what happened. None of that matters. Lena’s an ok person in my book. I may not know her, but I know vamps like her don’t want to cause any trouble.”

“But what about …” Kara began.

“You like her, she likes you, she’d better not hurt you, blah blah. I don’t care. I don’t want to know. But what scares me to the core is this whole Mike Matthews thing stinks of a really bad witch. The way he convinced you and other women to go for his scams. It’s a charm, a good one. Knowing you, I thought there was a good chance the two of you might go all Scooby and Shaggy, poking around too close. When I got all handsy I was putting a protection ward on you. It’s just a powder, but it’s strong stuff. It should have worked. I don’t know what could do this to a vampire. Without that ward I think she might have died for real. You need to be careful. Whoever it is is really powerful, and they might be after you, too, now.”

“Who do you really work for?” Kara asked, trying to temper her anger.

“You’re right, I don’t work for the FBI. I won’t say who because it’s important to keep this kind of supernatural stuff out of the public eye as much as possible. As its own mostly self-regulated ecosystem it’s fine. But if it ever got out, there could be mayhem. Religious types getting militant. Violence. People trying to hunt down …” Alex took a breath and eased down, trying to focus. “All our research says it could get bad fast. And I love my job, so, yes, I lied. You’re a reporter, for gods sake. But this is a real emergency, and Lena’s in trouble, so just trust that I know enough to help. I hope.”

“So what do we do? Will she get better? She said she had to feed when she got burned by the sunlight.”

“We need to know what happened to her tonight. I think she’s in shock. She may have been zapped by some kind of binding spell, or maybe something I haven’t come across. I met Mike that one time, and I feel like I would have picked up on it if he was that powerful of a witch. I think we need Lena to tell us what happened, and she can’t do that as a bat.”

“Then what?”

“How do you feel about letting her bite you?”

“I’m not sure she would want that,” Kara said, feeling conflicted. She desperately wanted to help Lena. “We haven’t talked about that at all. It seems like a big deal.”

“She may not want it, but it might be the only thing to help her back to herself. I don’t know how long she can stay in bat form and still come back. I think just a few drops would do it considering her size.”

“Would it need to be a bite? What if I just feed her a little blood?”

“Not sure. We haven’t ever been able to study this. The bat thing … it’s rare.”

“I just don’t want to do something she wouldn’t consent to,” Kara shook her head. “There’s been enough boundary crossing lately. It needs to end.”

“Think of it this way,” Alex said. “Would Lena want to be in a condition to help you get on top of this before it potentially gets worse, or stay a bat with an unknown chance of coming back to normal?”

Kara stood with Lena in her arms, deep in thought and gently stroking the top of her head.

“I really am sorry, Kara,” Alex said. “I want to help. I’d do it myself but I have a feeling she really wouldn’t want it to be me.” She placed one hand on her hip and the other behind her head, regretting the spying she had done. But at least it gave her some context in this situation. “I know you must have some pretty strong feelings for her. Right?”

“Like this …” Kara said, nodding to Lena’s limp form, “She couldn’t bite me unless we forced her to, and I don’t want that. Have you got a sharp knife or something?”

“I have blood lancets in my kit,” Alex replied.

“Okay, let’s do it.”

While Alex removed trays from the case to reach the lancets, Kara stroked the back of Lena’s head, hoping it was comforting. Alex pulled out a small can and popped the top. She handed it to Kara. “Drink this.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a supplement to help with blood loss.”

“You said it would just be a few drops,” Kara objected.

“Yeah. Right now,” Alex said as she tore open an alcohol wipe. “We don’t know what the rest of her recovery will look like. And after I leave here tonight … I’d rather be safe than sorry, you know?”

Kara knew that if Lena was conscious enough to make her own decisions, and if she needed blood, Kara would gladly give it. So she drank the supplement. It was a little chalky at first and finished with a metallic tang, but overall not terrible.

Kara placed the empty can on the table and Alex held out a hand, palm up. Kara placed her right hand into it and soon Alex was squeezing the pad of her middle finger and drawing it toward Lena as the blood welled into a sphere.

Alex put her index and thumb at the joint of Lena’s jaw, massaging it open.

“Be gentle,” Kara said.

“I am. Ready?”

Kara nodded. Alex let three drops fall onto the rough tongue. Almost as soon as she had swallowed, Lena began to squirm and opened her mouth wider.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to try to wrap this up as soon as I can while staying true to the characters and the plot. I'm also packing up my shit and moving into a new (old) house, plus repainting walls and all the stuff that goes with moving. 
> 
> So, I'll be thinking and writing while I'm packing and patching walls. Reading your responses really gives me life.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry it has been so long since I updated. This chapter is short-ish, but I hope you like it. 
> 
> Thank you, sincerely, for your patience and support. My move back into my new/old house is going well.

Lena woke afraid and disoriented. Her wings were bound around her, and she immediately struggled. Opening her eyes, she squeaked and squinted.

“Alex, turn off the lights.” 

The voice was familiar but not dangerous, so she stopped struggling so strenuously. Still, she didn’t like being bound up like this. She kicked her feet a little.

“Do you think she’s ok now?” the voice asked.

“Should be. We won’t know for sure until we can talk to her,” another answered.

“I don’t think she likes being wrapped up.”

“Well don’t let her …”

Freedom. The binds had loosened and she had whipped her wings up, twisted, and launched into flight. It was a small space, but home. She knew it. She circled the rooms, flying high, close to the ceiling.

“Kara!”

“She was afraid. I needed to let her go.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Yeah, I do. I don’t know how.” She spoke to Lena. “It’s ok. You’re safe now.”

The attic door was closed. She was tired. She didn’t feel quite right. She lit on one of the stalks of the chandelier, grabbing on with her feet and dangling. She didn’t like the cold metal. It wasn’t as good as the attic beams.

“Well, great. What do we do now?”

“We let her settle. She just woke up from whatever state that was. It must’ve been awful.”

Lena liked that voice. When she dropped it only took one beat of her wings to fly to it.

“Oh!”

“Ha! I guess she’s still into you even when she’s a bat.”  
The surface was soft, the person was warm. Lena’s feet caught easily in the material and she tucked her face under a wing and clung on with her thumb claws, too. She dozed off almost immediately.  
_____

Kara stood in the dim moonlit room with a bat attached to her sweater, head down. In fact, head down and sort of nuzzled between her breasts. Lena was snagging it thoroughly at each attachment point and Kara didn’t even care. She just held her hands out in front of her as if she might need to catch her to keep her from falling.

She might have been more annoyed at Alex’s smirk, but she couldn’t get past thinking how adorable Lena was at the moment.

“Ok, so I think the crisis has been averted. My guess is she’ll need some rest and recovery time,” Alex said. She returned to her case and pulled out two more cans of the supplement, the entire supply she had with her, and set them on the dining room table. “To have around. Just in case,” she said. 

“Ok.” Kara looked a little uncertain.

“Um. Look, I’m really sorry I nosed into your business … way over the line. I trust your judgment, so I’m going to get out of here. Just, ah, call me when she can talk about what happened and I’ll come right over.” 

“Alex, is there something you’re not telling me?” Kara asked.

“No. Yes?” Alex hedged. Kara wanted to cross her arms over her chest, but Lena was there, so she put her hands on her hips instead. “This is conjecture, so don’t take it as fact. I think that when she shifts back she’s going to need to feed again, and I think you’d better bring up the subject quick so that you know how she feels about it. She likely has her own emergency resources. But, you know, she’ll be back in that human-size body, she’ll need more to recover from whatever knocked her cold like that.”

Kara nodded, taking in the information as best she could. Her life was going to be very different with Lena in it, she felt.

“And now that I can be upfront about things,” Alex said, “I’d like to put some stronger wards on your house and a power beacon on the neighborhood.”

“Stronger wards?” Kara asked.

“Um, yeah. When you moved in I just put some simple ones on to protect it. Little stuff, like burglars and falling tree limbs. But I’m worried about whatever force is working with Matthews. And the beacons can analyze what kind of power comes into the vicinity so we have some data on what we’re up against.”

“Ok, do it,” Kara said, but her attention was on the bat clinging to her chest. She gently stroked the fur on her head. “Why aren’t you more worried about Lena needing to feed when she wakes up?” Kara asked softly, concern of her own leaking into her voice.

Alex stepped up to her and hugged her from the side, placing her chin on Kara’s shoulder and being careful not to disturb Lena.

“One of the reasons I ended up in this job was because I have a good sense about these elements in our world. Vasquez too. And we may not know a lot about vampires specifically, but what we do know is that the ones who just want to lay low and live their lives, like Lena, they’re fiercely private, and even more fiercely loyal. And they’ve spent decades, sometimes centuries, learning control. Lena may have learned more if she’d had another vampire …”

“Hemovore,” Kara interrupted. 

“What?”

“It’s a different word that describes Lena without using the one that comes from a horror genre.”

Alex rolled her eyes, pulling away to look at Kara. “Don’t you think it falls a little short? I mean, if you went with nocturnal sun-allergic werebat enchantress hemovore and who knows what else she can do …”

“Ok, stop. I get the point. It’s just the other word automatically sounds evil,” Kara said.

Alex took Kara’s hands in her own. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Most vampires aren’t bad at all. That’s one reason we’re not busting down doors trying to learn more or expose them. They don’t kill and they don’t wreak havoc. The ones like Lex are few and far between. So I have confidence Lena will have a handle on what she needs when she wakes up. And I’ve seen how she looks at you. She’d sacrifice herself before she let anything harm you.”

“If you’ve got such a good sense about stuff, why did you let me buy the house?”

“Well, I did warn you about Mike and not to let him get too close. He stinks of bad news. But this house … Something really good is on the other side of this, Kara.” 

Kara smiled at that reassurance. She had a similar feeling as well. “Then how come you felt it was fine to betray my trust and spy on me?” she asked, not wanting to let Alex off the hook for that quite yet. 

Alex scratched the back of her head and looked down. “Um … the downside is I don’t always have particularly good instincts about when my own actions can get me into to trouble.” She lifted her head to look at Kara again and shoved her hands into her back pockets as she shrugged. “Vas would have stopped me if I was about to do permanent damage. She told me not to do what I did. We have to let each other make mistakes sometimes, though. It’s just how the world works.”

“There is so much to process,” Kara said, shaking her head.

“You’ll be ok. You’re the strongest person I know,” Alex told Kara, leaning in to kiss her cheek and then picking up the case from the dining room table. “I’m going to place the the wards and the beacon and then go home and get some sleep. You try to rest, too. And call me when I can talk to Lena about what happened.”

Kara walked Alex to the door and said goodnight before she closed and locked it behind her. Moving slowly and gently she checked the back door lock and got ready for bed, Streaky following her from room to room until Kara settled in Lena’s bedroom. 

She turned on the bedside lamp since even the moonlight didn’t reach this protected space. Kara couldn’t take her sweater off with Lena attached there, but she did manage to unfasten and work the bra out from under her shirt, and she took off her jeans and kicked them away. A wave of exhaustion swept over her as she pulled back the covers on the bed. 

The bat on her chest clung on as she sat down on the mattress and pulled her legs up under the sheet and blankets. Kara lay down on her back, reached over to turn off the bedside lamp, and felt the gentle thump of Streaky joining her as she relaxed into the pillow. Once Kara had pulled the covers up to her stomach, the cat sauntered over, gave Lena a sniff to be sure she was well, and then took the pillow next to Kara’s as her bed for the evening.  
_____

Kara woke to the feeling of a drastic shift in the bed and a new weight pressing down on her. A gasp escaped her as her eyes flew open in the pitch dark room, and it took a moment or orient herself. The first thing she recognized was the scent and feel of Lena’s body on top of her. It was like a dead weight and she struggled out from underneath her and turned on the light.

Kara felt odd as she was, dressed in her underwear and shirt and sweater, but Lena was fully clothed. Kara lifted the blankets that had mostly been wadded down to the bottom of the bed during Lena’s shift to find Lena’s boots still on.

“That’s so weird,” Kara muttered to herself. Though she supposed it was certainly convenient to Lena not to have to disrobe to change into her bat form, or to shift back to human state in unconsciousness and wake to find herself naked. 

Kara set about the task of taking off most of Lena’s clothes, which was much more difficult when the woman wasn’t awake. She grew more frustrated and less gentle as she struggled to work Lena’s arms from her tight-sleeved shirt, leaving her in a chemise and her underwear. 

Kara had noticed, too, that Lena was very cold, as she tugged and pulled Lena’s body to the center of the bed. She arranged Lena in what would be a comfortable position when she woke then quickly removed the rest of her own clothes and tucked herself under the covers, leaving the light on and wrapping her warm body around her lover’s as best she could.  
_____

Pain wound through her chest, and her hands felt like they’d been beaten and stretched on a rack. Against her better instincts—never show pain or vulnerability—Lena cried out and curled in on herself, trying to smother the flare of agony that blossomed inside her. She recognized a comforting warmth that enveloped her. It shifted.

“Lena?”

Kara. She was in bed with Kara. This pain was familiar if more intense than usual. It was the pain that came with shifting back. With difficulty she unfolded her body and wrapped her arms around the woman next to her, spreading her aching fingers across warm skin, letting the heat permeate her cold flesh.

“Are you awake?”

Lena nodded, unable to form words yet. Fuzzy memories of her earlier encounter with Matthews rose to the surface, that feeling of helplessness, of something else locking down her body and preventing her from moving. But she had made it back home, to Kara, somehow.

Gentle hands stroked the crown of her head as they held her. Part by part, Lena’s awareness of her own body came back to her. She was uninjured in a way, but in another something was deeply wrong. 

The yawning maw of hunger hit her like a blow.


	15. Chapter 15-rewrite

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The old Chapter 15 didn't work for me. To catch you up on where the story was: Lena had managed to return from Mike Matthews' house as a bat. Streaky heard her and rescued her. Kara panicked because Lena wasn't moving and called Alex for help. Alex arrived with her paranormal first-aid kit and came clean about her real job … to a degree. They revived Bat-Lena with a few drops of Kara's blood. Kara took her to bed where she morphed into her human form and later came to consciousness with a roaring hunger.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had to rewrite Chapter 15. Sorry for the long delay, y'all. I think I've got it figured out from here. 
> 
> I'll post the old Chapter 15 on my tumblr rebellionbear account if anyone wants to revisit it.

“Fuck! Arrnng!” Lena blurted out, her body tightening from the spasm of hunger that rocked her, and her fangs sliced down and extended into position far too quickly, nearly piercing her bottom lip. _Fuck!_ She twisted away from Kara, out of her arms and crawled to the far side of the bed.

She felt wired and exhausted at the same time. Everything brittle and taut, as if she hadn’t switched forms properly and was stretching a bat-sized mass of molecules and warping them into a human form. She ran her hands up her arms, but the skin didn’t break as she feared it would. 

“What’s wrong?” Kara asked, urgent with worry. Lena held out a hand behind her, begging her to stay where she was. The hunger flipped in her belly like a cat alerted to the sound of prey.

“Stop,” Lena’s hands balled into fists as she pulled her focus inside. Kara stilled where she was.

Instinct and intellect worked together as Lena assessed her situation. It wasn’t long until daybreak. Maybe two hours. She was in a state she had never experienced. The pain from the transition was tainted somehow with a tarry darkness, intensified and made bitter. She felt colder than she ever had. Something else had happened … He’d said it was his mother. Whoever she was, she had some kind of powerful dark magic that Lena had tripped when she scaled the house. That contemptible …

“Lena?” Kara spoke softly.

“Just … wait,” Lena rasped.

She was almost certain that it was whatever bond she had developed with Kara that had saved her. It had given her the tiny window to her own magic to be able to slip through the tendrils of paralytic poison that had wrapped around her. She latched onto that. Kara had saved her.

That light that was Kara. That’s what had given her the strength. She almost laughed but it came out as a whimper. She could feel Kara respond behind her, sitting up and leaning toward her.

“Lena, please let me help you!”

Lena frantically waved her off again. She breathed in deeply, pulling the scent and essence of Kara inside her … once, twice. It helped center her, but in turn the hunger roared. “I will. Kara. I need … a moment,” she whispered. It sapped her energy just to say the words. 

The part of her that ached with a need to repair herself thrashed against her will, but her will was strong. Lex had told her to let it free, to take and destroy, like a god. He’d told her that all mortals were fuel for their fire. He was a monster. So in the early years after her change she had tested her will time and time again until it was unbreakable, forged by fire. 

The first thing she mastered on her own was controlling the hunger. Once she could isolate it and recognize it for what it was, it couldn’t rule her. So she focused now, and she felt her fangs retract, the flesh that sheathed them painfully dry. She accepted the pain. She pulled it in and welcomed it and made it a part of her instead of fighting against it. Almost immediately she felt better, barely. More herself at least. She willed her body to relax, her limbs releasing their rigid hold, though the tarry energy still filled her, and she sat up on the bed beside Kara, who allowed a space to remain between them, giving her some room. 

She heard Kara’s sigh of relief as she released her own tension.

Lena had to force herself to be still. It was the oddest sensation being in her body right now. She felt dried out yet restless. Like a mummy on coke, she mused to herself. She had a momentary flashback to a gala at the Hearst mansion and a leering billionaire whose metacarpal snapped like a twig as she removed his hand from her … she shook off the image. 

Other dark memories rose to the surface in its wake. The worst ones. Like someone had opened the crypt she kept them tightly locked away in, and now they were beginning to swirl like a swarm of hornets.

The fear in the eyes of the woman she’d taken after Lex burned her hand. The clutch of terror in her own chest as Lex turned on her. Jealousy rocking her as she stood by Mina at her wedding and smiled through clenched teeth. The coldness in her heart as she did what she had to do to the corpses of her brother and mother … the smell of the mortuary …

“Stay with me,” Kara said, laying a hand on Lena’s arm. The hornets swept away into the shadows and Lena was back in her bed. With Kara.

She wanted to tell Kara what happened. The nightmare of it. But now, though she had spoken enough to keep Kara away from her before she regained control, now she couldn’t seem to be able to form words and she was barely holding herself together. She focused on the warmth of Kara’s hand and held onto it like a lifeline.  
_____

Kara was afraid. Lena looked like she might shatter into a million pieces at any moment. Her eyes had lost focus and she seemed to be losing herself even more. Kara had reached out to her without thinking, but it seemed like it had been the right thing to do.

“I’m going to help you through this, Lena. I don’t know what happened out there, but you’re home now. I’m going to help you.” Kara noticed that Lena seemed even colder now, like the little bit of energy she had expended and a few minutes of being away from Kara’s body heat had immediately leeched what little warmth her body normally held.

“You’re very cold, and I think it would be good to get you warm again,” Kara said softly. “Is it ok if I get close again?” She felt Lena stiffen and somehow she knew the hemovore was fighting her hunger in addition to whatever had hurt her out there. She didn’t move her hand, but she didn’t get closer

“It looks like you’re having a hard time communicating. Can you understand what I’m saying now?” Kara asked, just to be certain. Lena nodded her head in response. 

“I know you have to feed to heal. You told me … about Leslie.” Lena’s eyes filled with a fear Kara didn’t quite understand.  
_____

Lena knew she had to feed, and soon, or it would get exponentially worse in every way. It would hurt worse and she would weaken more until she was in an uncontrollable hell that led to madness. She knew Kara was willing. She could tell that’s where this was going. But it terrified her. She had never had a nightmarish reaction like this before, and what if that energy spread to Kara?

“When you got here, as a bat, you were completely exhausted and you stopped moving or breathing. I was afraid you were dead. Really dead. Alex came to help and we pricked my finger and used a few drops of blood to revive you.” Kara watched the look of fear turn to astonishment, and she went on as if they were having a conversation. “I know! There is so much about Alex that I did _not_ know. You’re not going to believe it. She’s like some secret agent for the supernatural FBI or something. She had a whole paranormal first-aid kit!”

Just hearing Kara talk with her like this, like it was any normal day, like she wasn’t a monster, like they had been together for years … was making Lena feel more grounded. She leaned closer to her and Kara took that as a cue to close the distance and wrap Lena in her arms. Warmth washed over her, and in a way it quelled the worst of her hunger. It was assuring. _Food is coming_. It eased her fear that she might tear into Kara’s throat with no control. As her brother sometimes would with those poor … _Stop!_ She fought the images back with a shudder.

“And in that kit is a supplement they give to humans who are, I guess, partners? of hemovores. I’ve had some already, and there’s more. For after.”

Lena tried to clear her parched throat, but it felt seared shut. She ended up pointing at the glass of water next to the bed.

“Sorry! Of course! I should have realized,” Kara chastised herself as she lunged for the water and held it for Lena, gently placing the rim to her lips. 

It was cool and clean, and even in life Lena thought perhaps water had never tasted so good. It freed her tongue and relaxed her throat enough to speak again, her voice raspy.

“There’s something else inside me, something psychic. Something I don’t know … it’s dark … perhaps an aftereffect of whatever paralyzed me. I’m afraid it could transfer to you.”

“My blood got you out of the paralysis before. You need it,” Kara encouraged. 

Lena’s mind raced. The link to Kara got her away from the house and Matthews. Her blood revived her when she was locked in bat form. But she hadn’t touched Kara yet, not fang to flesh. Kara seemed to be reading her mind.

“I know this is different, but I think it’s the only way. And if anything happens, I know Alex can help us. I can help you. I need you. I love you,” she whispered the last.

And though she was still afraid, Lena knew in that moment that she would accept this gift. How could she refuse it when it felt like the love from this woman who was so good, so compassionate, so caring, when it felt like her love was the only thing that could defeat the toxin that had been forced into her?

Lena nodded. Kara helped her finish the glass of water and returned it to the bedside table.

“So … What should I do?” Kara asked, shuffling as if to get in a better position for Lena to have access to her throat. 

Lena stilled her with a hand to her chest. “Wait,” she said. “I can’t just …” she whispered. “Can we lie down? I’m so cold.”

“Of course.” Kara helped Lena shuffle back down on the bed and under the covers, pulling Lena’s body half on top of her own. Lena somehow felt lighter, more delicate than she had before when they were sharing a bed. 

“Talking helps,” Lena said softly. “I need to feel a little more myself before we …” She couldn’t finish. “This isn’t how I wanted it to be … you and I, if we ever … not that I was planning to,” Lena’s voice trailed off.

“Shhh,” Kara soothed. “You sound like me, rambling like that. It’s going to be ok. I did a little research you know, on lore, and fiction. I don’t know what’s real or if any of it’s even close.” Kara held Lena close, rubbing circles at the small of her back. 

Lena huffed a quiet laugh and felt another step closer to normal.

“Why don’t you walk me through it,” Kara continued. “Tell me what you usually do with your … what do you call them?”

“Food,” Lena said simply. “I don’t let myself get close. They’re strangers. Mostly,” she added. “Once I get consent to feed, and to make them forget …”

“Wait,” Kara interrupted. “You tell them you’re a vamp…” she stopped herself “a hemovore and get consent to bite them? And you can make people forget?”

“I look for people who wouldn’t be opposed to the idea. With decades of practice I can tell. There’s a type. I don’t tell them everything, of course. I let them see what they want to see when they look at me. I project a little to let them know that they’re not in danger.”

“That’s fascinating,” Kara says. “Does it hurt much?” she asked. She wasn’t not afraid, but she wanted to be prepared.

“Not if enough endorphins are present. My … subjects” she didn’t want to call them food anymore “are usually quite aroused when I … take what I need.”

“I see,” Kara said, and Lena felt her shift her body. The hand at Lena’s back drifted to the thigh that was draped across Kara’s own. Lena felt her hunger rumble and her fangs began to slide from their sheaths.

“Oh,” Lena breathed out involuntarily. “Kara, I … I don’t have enough strength yet to do what I would normally do, to build you up to that point.” She lifted her head with effort to look up and met Kara’s intensifying gaze.

“Can you kiss me?” Kara asked.

“Yes.”

“Then I think I can take care of the rest for you,” Kara whispered. Her bold confidence surprised Lena as it had before. As Kara bent to meet Lena’s lips with her own, Lena felt Kara gently push her thigh lower, guiding them both into the position she wanted. She felt Kara spread her own legs as she took Lena’s hand in her own and set it on the inside of her thigh. 

“Lena,” Kara paused a moment. “I don’t want to forget,” she whispered.

Kara deepened the kiss and raised her knee. She began to touch herself, and as her body responded, Lena responded with her. The cool hand on Kara’s thigh moved to cover Kara’s, which was now slipping fingers through her slickening lips and sketching up around her clit.

“Is this ok?” Lena asked, her body warming already in Kara’s embrace.  
“Yes. Yes,” Kara said, flicking her tongue across the point of one of Lena’s fangs and making her gasp. “You seem to be regaining some strength already,” she murmured, feeling the pressure of Lena’s hand on her own growing stronger, beginning to direct rather than follow.

It was true. The energy that raised nightmares from her past was receding, diluted somehow, like it was unable to cling and attack as it did before. It was sluicing away under the wash of Kara’s strength.

Lena focused on the two of them. Her hunger was coiling in readiness, but in the schooled way that she had trained it to. Her level of control felt far more in hand than she had hoped. And Kara, sweet Kara next to her was lost in kisses and touch, giving herself over completely to this moment now that they both felt a little safer and had consented to what would happen next.

Lena could feel the heat roaring off of Kara, and it was true, it fueled her. She did feel stronger. She climbed on top of Kara, straddling a thigh as her own hand took over and she slipped two fingers inside, tasting Kara’s gasp on her lips, feeling the hips rising and grinding beneath her, feeling the hum of a moan that became nearly continuous.

Lena lifted her body to sit up and her gaze fell to Kara’s fingers, the ones that had just been where her own were now. She gently grasped Kara’s wrist and took them into her mouth, stroking them with her tongue as they were nestled between her fangs. The taste was perfection and she purred with the pleasure of it. She kissed Kara again, sharing the experience. 

She was ready. 

Her lips moved from Kara’s down to the column of her throat. The tips of her fangs trailed across skin as her tongue dowsed for the blood coursing beneath. Kara’s hands grasped her shoulders and Lena could feel she was getting close. Kara’s muscles were bunching and her hips grew insistent. 

“Lena, please, please. I want this,” Kara urged, her voice nearly caught in the constriction of her throat and anticipation thrumming inside her. Lena curled her fingers into shorter strokes, and as Kara came hard with shouts echoing through the room, Lena rose up, watching her lover ride the burst of pleasure as she ground her own slick core on Kara’s skin.

She could feel the tingle at the root of her incisors as the tips sharpened to their final readiness. Her upper jaw ached in response.

Kara’s eyes fluttered open as her body relaxed. “Lena … I thought … why didn’t? …” and she couldn’t speak anymore as she realized that Lena was still moving inside her, adding a third finger, and something like a magic she couldn’t describe was building. “Oh!” 

Lena’s gaze locked with Kara’s until she couldn’t hold it anymore. She closed her eyes and threw her head back, falling into an all-enveloping awareness that was attuned to the pounding of Kara’s heart, the sheen of sweat on her skin, the path of every artery, vein and capillary, and the mounting crescendo of her nervous system. It blended, too, with her own unique human—and yet not—responses, guiding them together to an exquisite confluence …

As Kara’s cries begin to fill the room, Lena’s voice joined in until it was muffled by the flesh beneath her lips. She steadied her mark with a firm hand at the base of Kara’s skull even as jolts of pleasure jerked at her hips and Kara writhed beneath her. Unerring teeth pierced skin and the flow of hot blood into her mouth was echoed by a gush of liquid into her palm. Kara’s howl of pleasure grew louder.

Lena’s own orgasm pounded steadily along with Kara’s pulse, and her mind unfolded in a way that engraved the experience indelibly into her memory, a fleeting, soaring ecstasy she might never experience again.

Prolonged and glorious as it was, so much more than Lena had even hoped for, the waves began to recede and so she pulled her mouth away from Kara’s throat. Her fangs retracted and she licked her lips, opening her eyes with a degree of dread to survey the damage she’d left. It wasn’t too much, and she sighed with relief. 

Kara was limp, her eyes closed and head lolled to one side, a bruising, swollen pair of punctures prominent against reddened skin. Lena knew it would heal cleanly, one of the benefits of her undead biology. 

Kara’s eyes drifted open and a dreamy look spread across her face. Lena tried a gentle tug to withdraw her fingers, but Kara clamped down on her hand with her thighs. “Not yet.” 

“Are you all right, love?” Lena asked.

“Wonderful,” Kara purred. “Are you feeling better?”

Lena thought Kara seemed surprisingly unfazed compared to the bone tiredness that other humans experienced after being fed upon. Her own body and mind felt restored, and not in the off-kilter, out-of-balance kind of way that she had experienced when she had to feed off-cycle in order to heal.

“I … I feel amazing,” Lena answered and watched as Kara’s smile grew a little smug. 

“Okay, now I’ll let you go,” the young woman responded and let Lena take her hand back with only a tiny wince. She immediately pulled Lena tightly into her arms and wrapped a leg around the other woman.

“You saved me,” Lena whispered with reverence. 

“You saved yourself,” Kara responded. “I helped, but so did Streaky and Alex.”

Streaky? Lena wondered. 

“And as much as I would like to lie here with you for the rest of the day,” Kara continued, “We need to call Alex so she can come talk with you about what happened before the sun rises again.” Kara emitted a mild growl as she reached for her phone.

____

Alex arrived soon after the call to find a much-recovered Lena answering the door wearing one of Kara’s college sweatshirts, and Kara in her robe, sitting with a bruised and punctured neck and nursing a can of the supplement at her dining room table. The scratch Kara had had on her nose hours ago was already healed. Alex did her best to not think about the practically glowing aura of satisfaction emanating from her sister.

Now that Alex was there, Lena gave them both the full story of what had happened at Matthews’ house.

“We’ve got to find this witch,” Alex grumbled. “Did Mike ever talk about his family, Kara?”

“Oh, yeah. He mentioned his mother a lot. Like he worshipped her. It was creepy, actually,” Kara said. “He’d say stuff like, ‘Oh, Mother would love this,’ or ‘Mother wouldn’t like that’ while he was showing me the house. What did I care if his mother would like or not like something?”

“But he always just called her Mother?” Alex asked, her face twisted with revulsion.

“Yeah,” Kara said, disappointed. “No, wait! He did say her name once. What was it?” She wracked her brain. It had been so insignificant at the time, and she was sure she had been trying to tune him out while she made her decision about buying the house. “We stopped at a bar for lunch and to go over some paperwork on the approval process. The bar television was on, something about a revolution somewhere, and he said, more to himself than to me, ‘Rita would never abide that kind of disrespect.’ And somehow I was sure he meant his mother because of how he said it. And I just thought it was a gross thing to say about people trying to overthrow an autocracy.”

Alex entered the name into a database on her laptop. “I get nothing on a Rita Matthews,” she said.

“Are you sure that was the name?” Lena asked. 

Kara pondered a moment. “I think so. The bar was kind of loud.”

Alex suddenly sat up stiffly, her eyes wider. She turned to Kara. “Rhea. Could it have been Rhea?”

“Yes! That’s it!” she affirmed. 

Alex turned pale and closed her laptop. “Rhea Gan is the most ruthless, powerful witch we know of. She’s been off the map for almost a decade, but she still controls a cadre of supernaturals with an iron fist. They do whatever she wants, from blackmail to torture to murder.”

As she spoke, the first rays of sunlight began to break across the horizon.

“I have to go,” Lena said. She kissed Kara’s head and looked to Alex. 

“As long as we know who we’re dealing with, we can handle this. We can take her down,” Alex assured her. This was an opportunity to do some good for the world. And she would do whatever it took to make sure Kara was safe.

She saw how Kara looked at Lena as they parted and how Kara watched as Lena retreated to her safe room upstairs, and she knew that she would now include Lena in that umbrella of protection as well.

Kara turned to her, determined. “Let’s see if we can get a plan in place and decide what to do next.”

“We will. I already have a few ideas. But then you’re going to go back to sleep, too. You may feel great now, but you still need more rest,” she said and then noticed the hazy smirk of remembrance spreading across Kara’s face. “Ew. Don’t think about that in front of me.”

_____

And so it was that hours later Lena found herself locked in the cellar holding a book titled “Spell Deconstruction, Deflection, and Somatic Defense.” She sat on the same divan from her library that she had considered dragging up into her attic, arranged on one of her more worn Turkish rugs at the edge of the dim glow of light from her work bench. 

She was frustrated, overwhelmed, and not above indulging in a pout. From the moment she had regained consciousness as the sun set, she’d been bombarded with instructions and information. Apparently the whole pack of her new, not-dead friends had been very busy while she’d been out. 

Her desire for a groggy wake-up snuzzle with Kara flew out the window as she had walked down the staircase to find the entire team, which now included the carpenter, J’onn, and a mysterious sparkplug of a person called Vasquez, who was Alex’s work partner. 

_Well why don’t we just call Cat Grant and have a press conference?_ Lena thought sarcastically, and then tamped it down, realizing that Kara’s top boss was Cat Grant herself, making it not out of the realm of possibility.

The rundown of events and the plan, coming mostly from Alex, who had assumed command with no consent at all from Lena, began something like this.

“Our first priority is protecting Lena and Kara, and we don’t have time to spare. Rhea could be on to us at any moment. Lena, we’re going to make it look like you’ve fled, gone to ground and licking your wounds after that attack,” Alex stated. She turned her gaze to Kara.

“We’ve got to do our best to make it look like Kara knows nothing and is absolutely not a threat, but we don’t know how much of that we’ll get away with. We don’t know if Rhea knows that Kara and Lena were acting together or if she thinks Lena was just out to protect her house. We have to be prepared either way. That’s where J’onn comes in.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, apologies for the long gap between chapters, and thank you so much for the encouraging prompts in the meantime. I'm at the beginning stages of getting a divorce, which is a good life change for me, but it's still not easy. 
> 
> Also, I started another WIP. I wanted to make it a one-shot, but it looks more like a two parter. Sometimes when one story is stuck it just helps to indulge in the pleasure of writing something else that's flowing easily from your imagination. I think I'm going to call it "Sorry, Baby," so keep your eyes out for that. 
> 
> Also, also, I'm hoping to get the next chapter of "Agency" out in the next couple of weeks.


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